In Repair
by forthecoast
Summary: What goes up must come down. Part II of Gravity. [MS]
1. Chapter 1

Title: In Repair  
Author: spyglass (Grace/inelastic)  
Rating: T  
Disclaimer: I didn't start the fire, but I did light the matches.  
Pairings: MS. Traces of others, but this fic is inherently MS in design.  
Category: MS, Martin angst, Sam angst, Spade family drama, addiction storyline, cast interaction, casefile.  
Spoilers: 5x19  
Summary: What goes up must come down. Part II of Gravity.

xxx

_too many shadows in my room  
too many hours in this midnight  
too many corners in my mind  
so much to do to set my heart right_

_oh it's taking so long i could be wrong, i could be ready  
oh but if i take my heart's advice  
i should assume it's still unsteady  
i am in repair, i am in repair_  
-John Mayer, "In Repair"

xxx

Sam hesitated, peering inside the small office window before flicking her wrist to wrap softly on the door marked Lisa Harris, MD.

Lisa was leaning over as she sat at her desk, the receiver of her phone held to her ear as she engaged in conversation with whoever was on the other end of the line. Lisa looked up and smiled at her, waving her hand and motioning for Sam to come in and take a seat. As Sam sat back against the leather couch in Lisa's office, she glanced aimlessly around the room and tried to seem as inconspicuous as possible while she waited for Lisa to finish on the phone.

She folded her arms protectively across her chest, rubbing her hands against her elbows as goose bumps rose on her skin. She shivered and wished she had not left her sweater downstairs at her desk, instead left only in her sleeveless blouse. That was always her problem with the summer months, the disparity of temperatures between the overly air conditioned federal building and the hot, muggy climate outdoors.

With a few last words and a quick goodbye, Lisa hung up her office phone and folded her hands carefully on top of her desk as she said, "Samantha, it's so good to see you. How are you doing this week?"

"Fine," she nodded and her posture stiffened, still not entirely comfortable during her sessions no matter how many times she attended therapy with Dr. Harris. "Things have been good so far this week."

"That's good to hear." Lisa picked up a pen and made a few notes as they spoke, flipping several pages back in her planner and looking up to make eye contact. "It's been about three months since you came back to see me," she stated matter-of-factly.

Sam laughed quietly and dropped her hands to her lap. "You sound surprised."

Lisa paused for a beat and replied, "You could say that I am. Pleasantly surprised, that is."

"I guess that's a good thing." Sam shifted her weight and her posture slackened as she relaxed.

The Monday following the Saturday evening she spent spilling her heart to Emily, she had sought Lisa out almost on impulse and asked if she could start having regular counseling sessions. Lisa had readily agreed, and they had met once a week ever since, talking about everything from Joe Henry and her relationship with her mother to her pasts with Jack and Martin to her feelings on whatever case she happened to be working at the moment. Surprisingly, Sam found therapy far more effective this time around.

She kept this to herself though, her suspicions high that Lisa would tell her that it was because this time she _chose_ to seek help. It was enough to hear the words in her head; she did not need Lisa to tell her this out loud.

"So, Samantha," Lisa began, leading with her eyes as well as her voice. "Is there anything particular you would like to talk about this week?"

Sam shifted to lean forward, her elbows resting on her thighs to support her upper body. She remained silent for a moment as she wondered how best to introduce the topic weighting most heavily on her mind. Finally deciding to just forge ahead, she blinked and inhaled deeply and said, "I finally had the conversation I've needed to have with Jack since the day we got back from Kenosha when Emily was missing."

Lisa immediately stopped scribbling on the notepad and set her pen down on her desk, looking up with expectant but encouraging eyes. Swallowing, Sam closed her eyes and willed her emotions to remain in check.

xxx

_Sam stretched her arms out in front of her body before taking the next page of her book between her fingertips and flipping it over. She yawned and adjusted the throw pillows behind her as she leaned back against the arm of the sofa and continued to read._

_She was just starting to get comfortable when she heard her buzzer ring. Sighing as she rose from her reclined position, she padded along her carpeted floor in bare feet before peering through the peephole at her unexpected visitor._

_"Jack?" She questioned almost accusingly, before realizing how harsh her greeting must have come across. "Sorry," she half-apologized. "Come on in."_

_Jack quickly stepped inside and shut the door behind himself, looming awkwardly just inside the doorframe. "Hey, Sam," he said finally. "I'm sorry to just drop in like this."_

_"It's, uh, it's fine," she stuttered in reply, taken aback by his sudden arrival. Finding her voice again, she walked back over to the sofa and said, "Are you alright?"_

_"Yeah," he replied, absent-mindedly looking around. "Yeah, I'm fine. I was just on my way to La Guardia to pick up the girls for the weekend when I got a message from Maria saying that their flight was fogged in and won't be able to get another flight until tomorrow night, so we're going to have to reschedule."_

_"I'm sorry." She bit her bottom lip pensively, still feeling tense and uncertain._

_"Yeah, me too." He shrugged. "I figured since I was out anyway, I would stop by and see how you were doing."_

_"I'm fine," Sam gave him a tight nod. "Just enjoying a Friday night inside reading."_

_Jack was still standing awkwardly at the edge of the room, so she motioned for him to come sit down. As he sat, she moved to the opposite end of the sofa and returned her book to its resting place on the end table. "I've been worried about you, Samantha," he said softly, adjusting his position so that he moved a little bit closer to her. "It's been awhile since we got back from your sister's case, and you haven't really talked about it since then."_

_Sam crossed her arms and narrowed her eyes, no longer willing to hide her bitterness. "I thought that was your plan, Jack. That we not talk about it anymore."_

_"Samantha," he said warningly, and she glared in response. "That's not what I wanted."_

_Sam sighed and scoffed in exasperation. She had not been purposely avoiding Jack since OPR had cleared her, but at the same time, she had not wanted to seek him out either. Initially she had been too furious with him at his flippant disregard for her feelings, and after some time had passed, she had been furious at herself for the constant hold she had allowed him to put on her life. "Maybe it's not about what you wanted at all, Jack."_

_Jack's mouth fell open at a slight angle, giving the appearance that he almost did not believe what he had just heard. He stared at her for a beat. "What is that supposed to mean?"_

_"You tell me, Jack." She was being short with him and she knew it, but she was running out of patience and rightfully felt as though she did not owe him an explanation._

_Jack squeezed his eyes shut tightly and reached out to hold softly onto her wrist, but she shied away from his touch. "Is this about you telling Martin?"_

_Narrowing her eyes and briefly wondering how he could have known, she rose from the sofa and stood in front of him, her hands on her hips. "This," she gestured between them "has nothing to do with Martin, and everything to do with us." She released a small, pulsed breath and tried to collect her thoughts. Uncertain of what had ultimately propelled Jack to visit her that evening, she knew she had to bring this to a halt before anything further happened. "It was my decision to make, Jack." She closed her eyes and held her hand up, signaling for him not to interrupt. "Regardless of your opinions on my choices in the personal arena, it was my decision to make." She repeated herself for emphasis, annunciating more clearly as she gained confidence._

_Jack had the decency to look ashamed. "I'm sorry."_

_"Don't be sorry," she replied, tucking her hair behind her ear. "Sorry doesn't change it."_

_"Still -" Jack sat up and straightened his posture. "Even after everything that's happened between us, I couldn't stand the thought of you not being there every day."_

_Sam smiled weakly and shrugged her shoulders. "There's a reason that the Bureau is so against relationships between junior agents and their superiors." Her hand wiped at a phantom crease in the leg of her jeans, and she continued, "We never had a clean break, and we've both let that cloud our judgment. It needs to stop."_

_Jack gazed up at her, sorrow evident in his eyes as he tugged at his shirt collar. "What if I'm not ready for it to stop?"_

_"Well, then I'm very sorry," she said resolutely. "Because I am."_

xxx

Sam fell silent as she finished relaying her story, folding her hands anxiously in her lap as she waited for Lisa's response. Both women remained silent for several minutes, and Sam wondered if maybe Lisa was waiting for her to add something else.

"Samantha?" Lisa urged, finally. Sam tilted her head to the side to indicate her attention. "How are you feeling about all of this?"

"I feel really good, actually." She gave a small smile and chewed her bottom lip thoughtfully. "I feel surprisingly..." her voice trailed off and she paused, searching for the right word "... liberated. I didn't expect to feel this way."

"How did you expect to feel?" Lisa smiled, her tone motherly and encouraging.

"I don't know," Sam breathed, wiping her hands along the seams of her pant legs. "I guess a part of me expected to feel sad about it; I mean, things are really over between us."

"It's normal to experience some degree of regret when you end a long term relationship." Lisa leaned forward against her desk, speaking slowly and with a psychiatrist's calculated accuracy but still managing to maintain her friendly approach.

"If I have any regrets," Sam replied with a small nod, "it's that I didn't do this years ago."

"You had to wait until you were ready," Lisa soothed gently. "This is a big step for you."

"I guess so."

"It is." Lisa nodded and gestured broadly with one hand. "You have come a long way in the past three months. I know some weeks it has been more difficult than others, but you have stuck with it and I think you are really making progress. You seem a lot happier than you were when you first came to me, kicking and screaming, a few years ago."

Sam smiled and laughed softly. "That's because I am."

xxx


	2. Chapter 2

xxx

_**chapter two**_

xxx

_i learned the hard way  
that they all say things you want to hear  
and my heavy heart sinks deep down under you  
and your twisted words, your help just hurts  
you are not what i thought you were  
hello to high and dry_

_convinced me to please you  
made me think that i need this too  
i'm trying to let you hear me as i am_  
-Sara Bareilles, "Love Song"

xxx

Martin stretched out his arms and brought the mouse to click the 'print' button on his computer screen, shifting in his chair while he waited for his report to print out. Waiting until the final page had printed, he reached for the case report and flipped through it once more, checking for typos. With an audible sigh, he signed and dated the last page and took a bite out of the sandwich that rested on his desk. As he chewed carefully, his head tilted to one side and he caught sight of Elena reading over a few files at the conference table and Sam walking up to sit down beside her.

"Hey, chica!" Elena cocked her head to one side and smiled brightly in greeting. "Where have you been?"

Martin turned around and focused his attention back on his computer screen just in time to hear Sam reply, "I was just upstairs for a little while."

The sun coming in from the windows glared brightly as it caught the side of his monitor, and he tried not to eavesdrop as Sam and Elena chatted amongst themselves. He would have to be a blind man to not notice how close the two women seemed to become over the course of the past few months and how odd that might seem given the way they had seemed to repeatedly butt heads in the first few weeks and then months of Elena's tenure in Missing Persons. Samantha in particular seemed far more open and receptive to Elena's overtures of friendship.

The fact did not escape him that Elena's improved outlook and disposition directly correlated to her relationship with Danny, while Sam's remained more or less unexplained as far as he knew. She no longer came into work each morning with her eyes dull and stagnant; her appearance crisp and professional but for a few moments when she would slip and he would see some deeper hurt hidden in her posture. Instead, she appeared calmer and more at ease; still the tough as nails special agent, but more comfortable in her own skin.

As the rest of the team began to gather at the conference table, he pressed the palms of his hands to his desk and pushed his chair backwards. He took a seat at the table just as Danny unceremoniously placed a folded-over copy of Mike Lupica's latest column down in front of Viv, who wasted no time in swatting Danny in the back of the head with the newspaper.

"I'm not really interested in reading about why the Mets have had more to overcome this season than the Yankees have," Vivian began matter-of-factly with a nod of her head. "Lupica," she continued as she gestured with her hands "is even more bitter than you are, Danny."

Across from him, Martin watched as Sam and Elena looked up from their conversation at the light argument between Danny and Viv. While Elena only rolled her eyes in jest, Sam tilted her head to one side and worked her tongue in her cheek as she remarked, "More bitter than Danny? I didn't know that was possible."

Danny turned to glare at her and replied, "Just wait and see what team has the best record in the NL at the end of the season, Miss Brew Crew."

"Hey! You leave my Brewers out of this," Sam scoffed, feigning indignation. "I can't even remember the last time they led the division; I am going to enjoy this."

Martin looked bemusedly between them until Sam's eyes met his. She smiled and laughed as he put on his best SportsCenter impression and deadpanned, "Hooray for beer."

Elena scanned between the four of them with her eyebrows arched. She finally turned to Danny and, still perplexed, raised her voice and said, "I don't get it."

Before Danny had a chance to explain however, Jack emerged from his office with a file in his hand and a solemn expression on his face. While the rest of the team had been far more relaxed and comfortable with each other in the last few months, Jack still remained withdrawn and had not made any overt efforts to extend the others' renewed inter-office friendships.

Elena turned her body as Jack approached and asked, "Did a new case come in?"

Jack took his customary seat at the head of the table and folded his hands diplomatically as he said, "I just got a call from Arlene Drysdale, a friend of mine over at Child Protective Services. One of her caseworkers got a call from a summer camp at Crestwood Country Day School on Long Island that one of their campers had gone missing at around 10:30 this morning."

"That's only two hours ago," Danny said, checking his watch. "What does CPS have to do with this, anyway?"

"The girl who went missing is in the custody of the state, after being taken from her mother's care about four months ago."

"Foster kid getting placed with a family on Long Island," Vivian remarked dryly. "Pretty good deal if you ask me." She paused for a few moments, glancing around the table quickly, and said, "What else is there, Jack?"

Jack sighed audibly, and his gaze lingered on Martin and Samantha as he said, "We're going to check a few things out as a favor for Arlene. She asked for us specifically because it seems that two of you are familiar with this girl's case already."

Martin's gaze immediately snapped up as he heard Sam draw in a breath across from him. Their eyes locked for a few tense, silent seconds before they both turned to face Jack.

"Melanie Watkins?" Sam asked breathlessly.

Jack nodded and immediately began to rattle off case details. Martin, however, was unable to focus as Jack spoke as he mentally called up the image of the young girl with wispy blonde hair and sad green eyes that he and Sam met while running down a lead during the Natalie Burris case. One quick glance at Sam told him that she was thinking the same thing: her eyes were cast downward at her notepad, but she held her pen still and he could not tell whether or not she was even listening at all.

"Elena and Viv, if you two could start cross-referencing this list of camp employees for anyone with a record," Jack walked over to the white board and tacked up a small three by five photograph as he began to hand out assignments. "Danny, you and I are going to go over to the school to see what we can find. And Martin and Samantha," Jack paused and focused his gaze at the far end of the table, "You two are already connected to this case. I want you to go interview foster mom at home; play your connection up and see what you can find."

The team rose and began to bustle about in preparation. After gathering his things, he walked up to Samantha's desk and gave her a bemused look as he watched her grab hold of her sweater. Only she would need a sweater in the middle of July.

"You are aware that it is over 95 degrees outside, right?"

"I am," she replied. She leaned over her desk to pick up the to-go cup that held her coffee and scrunched her nose in distaste, "That means that every building in the city - this one included - cranks their air conditioning up to full blast."

He fell into step beside her as they headed to the elevator and, as they waited for the car to arrive, she turned to him and said, "My car is getting serviced right now. I'm assuming that you won't mind driving?"

The elevator doors slid open as the familiar bell announced the arrival of the car, and Martin automatically slipped his hand to Sam's lower back as they entered. He dropped his hand almost as soon as he felt the electricity at the contact, and immediately turned to the side panel and depressed the proper button for the parking garage. The button lit up, and he leaned back against the wall of the car as it jerked into motion. Sam smiled weakly at him, and he knew that they were both recalling the same memory.

xxx

_"I'm driving," Sam announced, spinning around to walk down the remainder of the courthouse steps backwards. She pulled her keys out of her pocket, holding up her copy of the car key that they had gotten from the rental agency._

_He quickened his pace so that he caught up to her just as they reached the bottom of the steps. He tugged on her hand, forcing her to face forward again as he pulled her against his side, relishing the close contact. They had only been seeing each other for a few weeks now and the rest of the team did not know, but Jack had sent them to run down a few leads in Savannah and they did not have to be as careful here, away from New York City. They had been good about being careful in the office, even when it was difficult to work so close together and not touch each other. They must have been, or else there was no way Jack would have sent them to Georgia together._

_As they approached the navy blue sedan that they had rented on the Bureau's dime, he saw his opportunity and seized her keys from her hand. She called out, and he backed up underneath the shade of a large tree covered in Spanish moss._

_She put her hands on her hips and her bottom lip jutted out, pouting. "Why won't you let me drive?"_

_"Because," he shifted his weight from one foot to the other and ticked off, finger by finger, as he explained, "We still have two more of his office buildings to check out, plus the old historic courthouse and the city council offices."_

_"And?"  
_

_"And as much as I know we want to get these done as soon as possible," he reached out and tugged gently at her elbows, and her hands fell to her sides. "We are also in a historic district with a lot of tourists. And it would behoove us, as federal employees, not to willingly endanger any of the aforementioned tourists. That would not be professional behavior."_

_She remained silent for a beat before walking directly up to him, pressing her body lightly against his, just enough to tease him as she gently grabbed hold of both of his hands. She leaned in and whispered in his ear. "Give me back my keys," she said throatily, "And tonight I might let you into my room and I can show you just how unprofessional I can be."_

_She laughed against him and it reverberated deep within him. He handed her the keys and climbed into the passenger seat of the car. She smiled at him as she turned the keys in the ignition and he knew, without a doubt, that she had won._

xxx

The elevator doors opened onto the third level of the parking garage, jolting Martin from the memory.

It was funny how that one short conversation was so representative of their entire relationship: Sam was always the one in the driver's seat and he had readily complied. By the time he realized what was happening, though, it was too late; he was already too far gone.

He frowned as they approached his car, suddenly becoming nervous as he tried to remember if Christine had left anything in his car from when they had gone out over the weekend. He froze for a second with his hand on the door handle before he pulled it open and slid inside.

He told himself that he should not worry about what Sam knew or did not know about Christine; it was no longer any of her business. But he could not fight the feeling that, for whatever inexplicable reason, he did not want her to know.

xxx


	3. Chapter 3

xxx

_**chapter three**_

xxx

_now that you're wiser  
surely you've learned to read it  
you should know  
no surface shines brighter  
than the light that burns beneath it_  
-Zero 7, "The Space Between"

xxx

"Here we go."

Sam craned her neck upwards as Martin walked up the steps ahead of her. "Yeah--" She exhaled and arrived at the top step onto the stone front porch, adjusting the hem of her shirt nervously as she watched Martin ring the bell. She took a deep breath as they waited for the door to open and silently willed her knees not to give way.

A strange tingling sensation had settled in the pit of her stomach from the moment she and Martin left the office. When she got into Martin's car and moved a sweatshirt out of the passenger seat and, in the process, noticed that it was a Northwestern sweatshirt.

A Northwestern sweatshirt that smelled distinctly of perfume, and that definitely belonged to a female.

If it were not devastating, she might find it almost humorous. She always knew that Martin would not stay single forever, but at the same time, she preferred it when she was not presented with tangible reminders that he had moved on.

She cautioned a glance to her side to take in his profile as they stood on the stone front porch of Cecilia Durbin's Long Island home. She assumed he had not noticed her quick shuffle as she tossed the sweatshirt into the backseat of his car. Or if he had, he offered nothing in the way of explanation.

In front of them, the door swung upon to reveal a woman in her late fifties. She had dark brown hair with streaks of gray evident at the roots. She was short and stocky, and her green eyes were bloodshot and weary. Her eyes darted from side to side and her face fraught with worry, she introduced herself and invited them inside.

Cecilia led them into the kitchen and took a seat at the table, motioning for them to do the same. Sam followed Martin and took the seat directly to his left, feeling relief as her knees gave way under her and she settled down in the kitchen chair.

"Mrs. Durbin," Martin began, folding his hands against the table top. "Like we explained to you on the phone, we just want to ask you some questions about Melanie and how she's been doing so that we can get a better idea of why she might have disappeared like she did."

"Alright." Cecilia nodded meekly, now appearing less outwardly anxious and instead appearing subdued and passive. Her concern for her foster daughter was evident as she took a deep breath and shut her eyes and said, "I want to do whatever I can to help you find her."

"Good." Sam shifted her weight and the chair creaked beneath her. "Melanie has been with you for a couple of months now, right?" Sam paused for a beat and watched as Cecilia nodded slowly. "This is obviously a big change for her. How has she been adjusting?"

"It was a struggle... at first." Cecilia sighed. "But she had really started to open up, especially recently. She seemed like she was finally happy here, which wasn't easy given all that she's been through."

"And what's that?" Martin prompted, giving Sam a curious look before turning his attention back towards Cecilia. They received a brief courtesy report from Child Protective Services as a follow up a few months before, when they had met Melanie while running down a lead during the Natalie Burris case. But the report had made no further mention of Melanie's home life other than to say that she had been removed from the environment and placed in the foster care system.

"Melanie doesn't talk about it much, but from what her caseworker told me, her mother is an alcoholic, and Melanie took care of her mother and her four year old half-sister." Cecilia looked between them with tear-stained eyes and said, "She really misses Katelyn, but I thought she had been adjusting. She seemed so happy until last week."

The sun crept out from behind the clouds and cast an eerie glow around the room, so Sam shifted until Martin's profile shielded her from the oncoming sunlight and asked, "What happened last week?"

"I arranged with Angela, our caseworker, to set up a time when she and Katelyn could see each other." Cecilia paused for a beat to wipe her tear-streaked eyes. "It seemed like she had a good time, but afterwards, she seemed... different. It was like she was pulling away from me."

xxx

_The door swung shut behind them, making a loud clattering noise before Cecilia turned around to turn the dead bolt. Satisfied that it was locked properly, she turned around and surveyed the kitchen with her hands on her hips and said, "Home again, home again..."_

_A few steps ahead of her, she heard Melanie's muffled voice from the closet where the young girl was hanging up her raincoat. She poked her head out from behind the closet door, her wet hair clinging to her face as she completed the line from the children's rhyme as had become their custom. Melanie wiped the water droplets from her face, her brows furrowed in concentration and her lips pursed together. She seemed serious but distracted, a far cry from the young girl who had finally begun to open up after several months of being moody and closed-off._

_"You had a good time today, right Melanie?" Cecilia asked, inching closer the pantry closet but stopping when she reached the small island in the center of the kitchen._

_  
"Yeah." Melanie nodded quickly and placed her small hands on her hips. She frowned, deep in thought, and rocked back and forth anxiously in place._

_The girl suddenly appeared even younger than she already was. She looked like a toddler who had something very important to say but did not quite know how to say it yet. Picking up on what she hoped would be a moment of vulnerable indecision, she gently suggested, "Do you want to relax for a little bit? We could take out a board game or play cards if you wanted to."_

_Melanie dropped her hands close to her sides as she answered carefully. "Actually, I think I want to go take a shower now. Is that okay?"_

_"Of course that's alright." Cecilia rubbed her cheek and offered the most genuine smile she could muster._

_Melanie turned and left without another word. Cecilia watched as she left and fought despair that began to settle in the pit of her stomach._

_After all, it was only natural to be disappointed. It seemed that in the course of one afternoon, all of the careful progress they were making had gone up in smoke._

_When she orchestrated a time for Melanie and Katelyn to spend a few hours together, she only wanted it to make Melanie happy. That plan clearly backfired, and she was left feeling more bewildered than ever._

xxx

"Since then she has spent a lot of time alone in her room." Cecilia wiped at her eyes and gave Martin and Sam a weak smile as she explained. "I don't know what happened that day that bothered her so much. I didn't want to push her too hard, but now I wish I had."

"You had no way of knowing." Sam spoke gently, trying to sooth the distraught older woman. "Is there anything else you can think of? Anything out of the ordinary?"

"No." Cecilia shook her head. "Nothing in particular."

"Then if it's alright with you," Martin said as he began to rise from the table. "We would like to take a look around. See if we can find anything that might give us a clue as to where Melanie might have gone."

Cecilia looked up through heavy eyes and uttered, "So you don't think that anyone... took her?"

Sam shifted her weight in the chair as she too began to stand, and said, "From what we know right now, it doesn't look that way." She paused for a beat and took in the distraught woman's expression before adding, "But I don't want you to worry. We are looking into all possible leads until we hear otherwise, and we will do everything in our power to find her."

Cecilia nodded in silent affirmation, and Sam began to follow Martin as he made his way upstairs. She stopped in the kitchen door, however, as she heard Cecilia call out her name.

"Yes?" Sam turned on her heels and leaned back against the doorjamb. She could hear Martin's steady footsteps on the stairs, and her heart began to beat faster as she watched Cecilia's broken, tired form slumped back on the kitchen chair.

"My husband and I never had any children." Cecilia sat up slightly and stiffened her posture, "And when he died, he left me completely alone." She paused to take a deep breath, the worry lines becoming more evident across her forehead. "But since Melanie has been here, I've felt alive again. Please... she has to be okay."

Sam gave a small nod and walked purposefully towards the stairwell. As she began her ascent to the second floor and towards the bedroom, she heard Martin's cell phone ring.

"Fitzgerald..." He uttered quickly, and she held her position midway up the stairs. His tone of voice changed almost instantly and she could hear the smile evident in his tone. "Oh, hey you."

She felt all the oxygen instantly leave her body. This was not a work-related call; this was the owner of the Northwestern sweatshirt.

"So you've got the rest of the afternoon off? That's great!"

Sam closed her eyes and swallowed, trying to quell the burning sensation she felt rise suddenly in her chest. She was torn between not wanting to eavesdrop into a clearly private conversation and being impossibly curious about this new woman in his life.

"... I'm sorry," she heard Martin's voice drop, suddenly sounding disappointed. "We just had a new case come in, and I have no idea what time I'll finish tonight. I'll give you a call if we finish up by 8:00 though."

She heard Martin say goodbye and hang up the phone, and willed her personal jealousy aside. _'You said you want him to be happy,'_ she reminded herself silently. _'You are going to have to get used to the idea that it's not going to be with you.'_

She slowly and deliberately began to make her way up the steps, taking her time to allow her personal feelings to subside. But as much as she knew Martin deserved better than she had ever given him, she could not help but feel a slight irrational hatred towards the new woman in Martin's life. After all, she promised herself that she would be happy for Martin, but she made no such promises about the other woman.

She chuckled at the absurdity of her thoughts and found the second door on the left. She turned the doorknob and let herself inside, her eyes immediately scanning the room. Her gaze landed on Martin, who stood with his back to her as he studied several picture frames on Melanie's dresser. He turned as he heard her enter.

"Hey," she breathed softly.

"Hey." He replied in kind, turning his attention back to the photographs in front of him. As she shuffled over to stand beside him, he asked, "Did Cecilia have anything else to say?"

"Not really." She shook her head and leaned in closer to inspect the two frames in detail.

"She looks pretty happy here," Martin remarked as he returned one frame to its proper position. In the photograph, Cecilia and Melanie were smiling at each other as they decorated ceramic mugs at a paint-your-own-pottery store.

"She does." Sam agreed, placing the other frame back beside the first. In this photograph, Melanie stood at the Central Park Zoo with a much younger girl who was clearly her sister Katelyn. Sam frowned and exhaled. "But her sister is the only stability she's ever known. It's not easy to get used to."

Martin turned and caught her eyes, telling her that he recognized the deeper meaning in her words. In that moment, Sam felt the room cave in and swallow her whole. She turned and made her way toward Melanie's desk, but she still felt Martin's eyes as the bore into her. Her breath hitched in her throat, and she silently began rifling through Melanie's drawers.

She pulled a small stack of notebooks out from the bottom drawer and began to flip through the pages one by one. The pages were blank and unused, and she sighed as she closed the second notebook and put it to one side. It was only as she picked up the third and final spiral-bound book that a few pages fell out. She leaned over and picked the loose papers off of the bedroom carpet, spreading them out on the desk in front of her as she inspected them.

"Hey Martin?" She rotated the chair around and leaned with one elbow against the edge of the desk. With he free hand she gestured to him and said, "Come take a look at this."

He walked up to stand beside her, folding his arms across his chest as he asked, "What is it?"

"Maps of the different Long Island bus systems." Sam replied, motioning towards the color-coded grids that lay on the desk before them. "This is the stop that's closest to the school." She placed her index finger on one of the maps, right at the spot that had been circled in black magic marker. "And it looks like Melanie was headed for the stop that connects to the subway."

Martin picked up the map in question and held it close to his face. He narrowed his eyes as he placed the map back down on the desk and said, "Well, it definitely looks like wherever she is, she went of her own volition."

"Yeah," Sam said softly. "But she's eleven years old and heading into the city. That's not exactly safe no matter who she is or isn't with." Sam breathed deeply and followed his gaze as it trailed back to the transit maps. "And that still leaves us with the bigger question. Assuming she got on the Subway, she could have gone anywhere..."

Martin gave her a weak half-smile and quietly finished, "... so then, where was she going?"

xxx


	4. Chapter 4

xxx

_**chapter four**_

xxx

_"i gotta rush away," she said,  
"i been to boston before.  
and anyways  
this change i been feeling  
doesn't make the rain fall"_

_no big differences these days  
just the same old walkaways  
and someday i'm gonna stay  
but not today_  
-Counting Crows, "Walkaways"

xxx

Martin held the glass door of the bus terminal open and ushered Sam inside. They shuffled forward, eyes scanning the crowds and the busy terminal. The main desk came into view in the far corner of the room, and he motioned to Sam to follow him to the vacated counter.

She reached up and rung the bell several times, buzzing impatiently for an attendant to come to the desk.

After a momentary delay, a man in his late thirties appeared, dressed in the navy blue bus company uniform and sporting a disinterested, casual appearance. "Can I help you?" he asks, his eyes wandering.

"I'm Agent Spade," Sam began in her no-nonsense Special Agent tone. "And this is Agent Fitzgerald. We're with the FBI, and we're looking for a little girl who we think was on one of your buses earlier this afternoon." She paused, leaning her head in closer to the attendant who appeared to be suddenly stiff and paying rapt attention. Sam narrowed her eyes and emphasized, "We believe that she was riding alone."

"I, uh... I..." the man stuttered, confusion and panic etched across his unshaven face. "Let me go get my manager," he finished quickly, turning and running back out of sight.

When the attendant had fully disappeared, Martin rolled his eyes ironically at Sam and quipped, "Another hard-working, middle class American citizen."

"That much is obvious," Sam replied, her voice tinged with sarcasm. She sighed audibly. "I can already tell he's going to be no help."

A few minutes later, the attendant re-emerged with an older woman in her early fifties, wearing a similar navy blue uniform shirt and a nametag that read 'Denise: Shift Manager' in bold black lettering.

"Agents," the woman named Denise spoke with a tone that mixed false cheeriness with condescension. "Travis tells me you have a few questions about a girl who may have been on one of our buses alone this afternoon?"

"Yes," Martin answered quickly, hoping to get a word in edgewise. Before he could say anything more, however, Denise jumped right back in.

"I can assure you that we never let any young children board our buses unless they are accompanied by an adult," she replied, her tone now entirely condescending. "We do everything to ensure the safety of our children."

"I'm sure you do," Martin commented, fighting back the urge to make a snide but ephemeral retort that go completely over the woman's head. He took out a copy of Melanie's picture from in between the cover of his notepad and placed it down on the counter in front of Denise and Travis. "Her name is Melanie Watkins. She's twelve years old and she went missing from summer camp at around 10:30 this morning." He paused for a second, eyeing both attendant and manager as they gazed cautiously at the picture. "And," he emphasized slowly to allow the full meaning of his words to sink in, "The FBI will be offering a reward to any information that helps us secure her safe return to her family."

At this, Travis' head snapped upward, his eyes darting from Martin to Sam and back again. "What can I do to help you?" he said confidently.

Sam tilted her head to meet his eyes, cocking her eyebrows bemusedly at Travis' lack of subtlety and tact. "We would like to talk to whoever drove a bus that would have stopped at the Round Swamp and North James stop between 10:30 and 11:00 this morning."

Denise nodded silently and turned to the computer screen. She slowly pick typed several letters into the computer and, with her other hand, adjusted the monitor around so that Martin and Sam could get a better look.

"You want to talk to Melvin, then," she explained. Her index finger pointed to one line on the daily bus schedule, her long, fake fingernail tapping softly against the computer screen. "He had Bus 93 today; that was the only bus to stop there between the times you indicated."

Sam folded her elbows across the counter and leaned in to study the screen in detail. Martin, meanwhile, squared his shoulders and firmly prompted, "So, how can we get in touch with this Melvin?"

"You're in luck," Denise gave them a tight, rehearsed smile. "He is due back from his route in exactly," she checked her watch for dramatic effect, "twenty minutes. If you'd like to just take a seat right over there, I will let you know as soon as he gets in." She gestured towards a row of plastic chairs right over by the newsstand and nodded her head before disappearing into the back room.

Martin cautioned a glance at Sam, and they simultaneously rolled their eyes and choked back laughter at the absurdity of it all. He was certain that they would have laughed if not for the seriousness of the situation and their concern for Melanie's safety.

The plastic seat creaked beneath him as he leaned back and rotated his stiff, tense shoulders. Unable to work out the kinks or to lessen the soreness he felt, he turned to where Sam sat beside him and found her to be engrossed in a tabloid magazine that someone else had left behind.

Even though he knew all too well that she was entitled to a few harmless guilty pleasures and that, for whatever reason, she enjoyed reading all of that trash, that did not stop him from wanting to tease her about her gossip mongering ways.

"What are you reading?" he asked, pretending to peer casually over her shoulder. "Anything interesting?"

"Nothing really," she replied, trying to sound nonchalant. "Just some entertainment news."

"Sam," he chided teasingly, "I don't think Lindsay Lohan's father's exclusive tell all interview is really going to tell you anything you don't already know."

"You don't know that," she commented, fake indignation gleaming in her eyes.

He laughed in spite of himself, glad for the distraction from all the worry of the case. "Oh, I do," he replied. "Because some things _never_ change."

xxx

"Agents?"

Martin's head shot around as he heard Denise's sugary-sweet voice call out from behind the counter.

"Follow me," she shouted above the din.

Martin stood, stretching his aching muscles as he rose, and followed Sam's determined footsteps behind the counter and into the back room of the bus terminal. They stood by the entrance for a few minutes while Travis, Denise and an unnamed man in uniform who had to be Melvin spoke in hushed voices twenty-five feet away by the staff lockers.

Martin felt a quick buzz in the pocket of his slacks where he kept his cell phone, signaling that he had a new text message. He quickly took his phone out and flipped it open, hitting the 'okay' button to read the new message.

_Hey u. Hope UR case is going well. Miss u. xx Chris_

He smiled to himself for a few seconds, thinking how nice it was to be seeing someone who was not afraid to share these small gestures of affection. He quickly typed a short reply, not wanting to draw attention to himself or the message, and returned his phone to its resting place in his pocket.

He was saved from Sam's curious glances, however, when the driver Melvin approached them. He was an average looking man, medium height and build with dark skin and dark hair, the type of man you would pass on the street and would never even notice; there was no other word to describe him but completely "average." He did, however, have a genuinely concerned and pleasant disposition that Travis and Denise seemed to be lacking, and Martin's gut instinct said that Melvin likely was not responsible for any foul play.

"Melvin Ramirez." He held out his hand as he introduced himself. "Denise told me that you wanted to ask a few questions about a girl who might have boarded on my route this morning?"

Martin nodded, shaking the man's hand firmly. "Yes. Her name is Melanie Watkins, and we believe that she boarded your bus heading towards the subway lines." He took out the photograph once again and handed it to the driver.

Melvin held the photo up close to his face and studied it intensely. Frowning, he handed the photo back. "Yes, I do remember her. I don't remember where she got on or who she was riding with, but she left her pink jacket on the bus. When another passenger noticed, we tried to chase her down but she ran away."

xxx

_Melvin glanced up in the rearview mirror and reached forward to release the parking brakes when he heard a woman's voice cry out from the back seat. Jerking his head around, he noticed a woman dressed head to toe in full business attire stand up holding a child's pink corduroy jacket._

_"Sir!" The woman called out, gesturing wildly to the crowd that had just exited the bus to the street below. "I think that little girl left her jacket behind. Wait just a second and I'll go run it to her."_

_He sighed, glancing at his watch. They were already running way behind schedule, so he might as well make sure the girl got her jacket back or else that woman in the backseat was going to have a stroke from the anxiety. He reached forward and hit the button that released the doors, and the woman went bounding out into the street, platform heels clicking in her wake._

_He stood on the top step at the front of the bus as the woman yelled into the retreating crowd._

_"Hey, little girl! Little girl!"_

_At the edge of the crowd, a thin young girl with blonde pigtails turned around and met the woman's eyes._

_"I have your coat!" The woman proclaimed, waving the pink corduroy jacket up in the air._

_The second the girl registered the woman and the coat, her eyes went wide with fear and she instantly turned around and bolted in the opposite direction._

_After a beat, the woman began to chase through the crowded street after her. But he blinked for a second, and the young girl had disappeared into thin air somewhere around the subway station._

_The woman stopped short, defeated, and turned back towards the bus._

_"Here," he offered, holding out his hand to her. "I'll take it and make sure it finds its way back to her."_

_The woman nodded meekly and trudged back to her seat, her expression somber and disappointed._

_Melvin frowned. Something odd definitely just happened, and he did not like the gnawing sensation he felt at the pit of his stomach._

xxx

"I should have done something more," he stammered. Visibly upset, he ran his hands over his face. "I'm sorry. I didn't know."

"You didn't know," Sam repeated, shifting her weight from one side to the other and brushing up against his arm in the process. "But anything else that you can remember would be a big help."

"I... I don't know."

"You said she disappeared right by the subway station, right?" Sam paused long enough for Melvin to nod affirmatively. "Well, what train did you drop her off by?"

"She could have picked up the A line or the S line," Melvin replied.

Suddenly needing to occupy his hands somehow, Martin wiped his hands against the seam of his pants. "What about the jacket?" he asked. "Do you still have it?"

"Yes, yes. Of course." Melvin turned to walk to the back corner near the lockers, motioning for them to follow. He lifted a large cardboard box and explained, "This is the portable lost and found for my bus line. Anything non-perishable that is left on the bus stays in here for two months and then it gets donated to Good Will."

Melanie's pink jacket lay across the top of the portable lost and found, and Martin's arms reached out to pull it off of the pile. He fingered the material of the jacket and immediately searched the pockets. He felt cool paper against his fingertips, pulling a copy of the NYC Transit map booklet folded down to the subway lines page.

Sam leaned in and studied the map alongside him. "Oh," she exhaled. "Look at this."

"What?"

"She circled the transfer from the A line to the G line," Sam answered. "She could take the G line straight to her mother's apartment building."

Melvin furrowed his eyebrows, staring intently at both agents. "What does that mean? Is she okay?" he asked hurriedly.

"We honestly don't know," Martin said. "It just means that we have an idea of where she might have been heading."

Sam folded the map back carefully and placed it in her jacket pocket. "Thank you for all of your help," she said diplomatically. "We'll be in touch if we have any more questions."

Melvin nodded. "Anything I can do to help, Agents."

Martin and Sam turned to make their way out of the bus terminal, but as they reached the door, they heard a voice calling back out to them.

"Hey Feds!" Travis leaned back against the rolling chair by the information desk with his feet propped up against a large stack of cardboard boxes. "When do I hear about my reward?" he smirked conceitedly.

Martin cursed under his breath.

"I'll tell you what," Sam called back in retort. "Because you were no help at all, I'll make sure it gets lost in the mail."

They laughed as they both hurried out the door and into the summer sunlight, before her words ever had a chance to sink in.

xxx

I'm really sorry everyone. I know I've been absolutely terrible with updates for this fic. Just wanted to let you know that your comments are very much appreciated, and I promise that I have not forgotten this fic. I've just been suffering from some horrific writer's block. :)


	5. Chapter 5

xxx

_**chapter five**_

xxx

_i feel it from the pit of my stomach  
into the ditch of my mind  
inside the chambers of my heart  
as i stare half blind  
at these walls of cardboard  
at this space that i've rented  
at your beauty that is crumbling  
though you try so hard to prevent it_  
-David Gray, "Let the Truth Sting"

xxx

At the top of the stairwell, Sam craned her neck around and glanced down the long, dark hallway that Melanie had lived on for the majority of her life. It looked no different from the day they visited several months ago, in search of a serial rapist and killer connected to a missing teenage girl, Natalie Burris, but for some reason today the hallway seemed vast and eerie, a dark cave with no end in sight.

She quietly followed Martin down the hallway and stopped in front the door marked '305,' the apartment where Melanie's mother Theresa lived.

"Theresa Watkins!" Martin reached out and rapped his fist on the doorframe several times. "Mrs. Watkins!"

After several minutes of incessant knocking, the door suddenly swung open in front of them to reveal "Mrs." Watkins - who could not be much older than twenty five.

"Hello?" Theresa Watkins squinted her eyes and grunted in greeting. Samantha took in her unkempt and disheveled appearance and instantly smelled the stench of alcohol on the woman's breath.

"I'm Special Agent Spade, and this is Special Agent Fitzgerald." She gave a terse nod of her head as she introduced herself and motioned to Martin. "We're with the FBI, and we have a few questions we'd like to ask you about your daughter."

Theresa frowned, a distinctly sour expression on her face as it took her several minutes in her hung over state to process this information. "I already answered all of that other lady's questions," she insisted.

"What other questions?" Martin asked, forcefully pushing the door the rest of the way open and stepping inside the apartment.

Sam followed him, and the door creaked as she shut it behind them. She cast her gaze around the apartment, taking in the dark, dank, messy single room; it looked like no one had cleaned up in months.

"That other lady who took my girls," Theresa explained, flopping down on the sofa right on top of a pile of dirty laundry. She groaned and flung one arm across her eyes as Martin turned on the overhead light. "She told me I wasn't being a good mother, and that she had to take the girls away from me."

Sam rolled her eyes. "I can't imagine why," she mumbled, her voice soft but laced with sarcasm. Coughing, she strode purposefully over to where Theresa lay on the ratty old sofa. "Listen," she said emphatically, grabbing Theresa by the arm. "Melanie is missing, and we have reason to believe that she was heading here to you. So you're going to sit up, sober up, and tell us anything you know."

At this Theresa seemed to snap from her daze, sitting up and straightening her posture. With a frown, she stuttered, "What do you mean 'missing'?"

"We mean," Martin began, shuffling forward so that he was close enough to make solid eye contact with her, "That she left her day camp this morning and deliberately took the bus, and then the subway, heading straight for this stop, presumably to look for you. When was the last time you saw your daughter?"

"I, uh," Theresa's voice broke, "I haven't seen either one of them since they took them away from me. They won't even let me call them."

"You're sure?" Sam asked, not attempting to hide her skepticism. With people like Theresa, she found it much easier to be frank and stern, and not to attempt empathy. In every one of these people, the drunks and child neglectors of the world, she saw the reflection of a man like her own father who could leave his wife and two young daughters behind, or of Joe Henry, the man who had taken not only her sister's childhood, but her own. And every time it strengthened her resolve to bring them to justice, for all the times she sat helplessly by and watched as it happened.

This was easy; this was something she could fix.

"Of course I'm sure," Theresa barked. "Don't you think I would remember speaking to my own children?"

"I don't know." Sam said, casting her eyes purposefully around the apartment to show her distaste in the younger woman. "Would you?"

"Of course I would." Theresa shut her eyes momentarily, then said, "And I wouldn't have seen Melanie today anyway, even if she had been here. I was... out last night, and I didn't get back until a little while ago."

"And you're certain you've had no contact with either one of the girls since CPS took them into custody?" Martin took down a few notes down on his black-leather bound legal pad, frowning as he spoke.

"Yes." Theresa said emphatically. "I know you must not think I'm much of a mother, but I loved my girls." She paused for a beat, pensive, and then added, "I was even cutting back on the drinking until just a few days ago."

"And what happened three days ago?" Sam asked, folding her arms across her chest; she tapped her ball point pen against her arm impatiently.

Theresa released a heavy, dramatic sigh and replied, "Their caseworker, Valerie, came by when I wasn't expecting her..."

xxx

_Theresa groaned and rolled over in bed as she heard the incessant pounding at her front door. Running one hand through her hair, she stumbled towards the door and opened it without looking._

_"Yes?" she grunted. She was quickly learning that drinking less made her far more irritable in the mornings than when she used to drink her normal twelve pack each night. She had not had anything to drink last night, and she felt absolutely awful this morning._

_"Hi, Theresa," the woman greeted her with an irritatingly perky smile. "I'm not sure you remember me, I'm Valerie and I work with Child Protective Services. I'm here just to do a quick follow up visit, so if you don't mind me inviting myself inside, I promise it'll only take a minute."_

_Speechless and somewhat stunned, Theresa simply stepped aside as Valerie walked into her apartment, heels clicking hauntingly against the floor._

_Valerie's eyes immediately surveyed the apartment focusing in on the empty beer cans that littered one corner of the room before landing on Theresa, who stood shaking uncontrollably._

_"Are you alright?" Valerie asked._

_Theresa despised the saccharine sweet tone of Valerie's voice._

_"I'm fine," she answered shortly. She could see through the false cheeriness in Valerie's demeanor; this visit was already not going well._

_This was the biggest pop quiz of her life, and she had failed miserably._

xxx

"After that, I'm pretty sure they'll never let me see the girls again," Theresa said, her expression suddenly stoic and blank, as though she were numb to the realization. "And I can't blame them, but they probably don't want to see me, either."

"You're their mother," Sam commented off-handedly, "I'm sure they want to see you. All of the information we have points to Melanie being headed exactly in your direction."

Theresa rubbed at her eyes. "Sure, whatever."

"How old are you?" Martin asked suddenly. "26? 27?"

"I'm 28," Theresa said with a sniffle.

"You're certainly not too young to turn your life around, then," he said. "You just have to decide that you want to get clean, you need that one big push in the right direction. That's all it takes."

Sam tilted her head to one side to study him as he tried to soothe the now weepy-eyed, broken woman who sat before them, but Martin's gaze fell straight ahead. Her heart fell suddenly; she had been certain that with his words he was referring to his own addiction and maybe even her role in his recovery, as small as it had been.

But he was not looking or thinking about her at all; his focus was where hers should be: entirely on the case.

"Yeah, right," Theresa snapped, clearly not buying into Martin's message of encouragement. "Just look at me," she sneered in self-deprecation, hands gesturing aimlessly. Theresa shifted her weight so that she was looking directly at Samantha. "You don't even have to tell me you're judging me: the pathetic little girl who got pregnant when she was fifteen years old." Theresa paused and narrowed her eyes. "But you have no right to judge me. How many fifteen or sixteen year old girls actually have their babies, anyway?"

"You'd be surprised," Sam remarked, trying to sound casual and off-handed in her comments. She inhaled deeply and inaudibly and narrowed her eyes. "But you became a mother the second you made that choice."

xxx

_"Fuck."_

_Sam cursed out loud as she reached to the bathroom counter and grabbed the old, ratty washcloth to wrap around her index finger. She held pressure on her finger long enough to stop the bleeding from where the tiny edge of the cardboard box had cut it, still silently cursing her own stupidity._

_Her entire body shook as she unfolded the tiny pamphlet that came with the home pregnancy test, eyes rapidly scanning the directions for where she could possibly have gone wrong._

_Because she had to have done something wrong. There was absolutely no way this test was telling the truth: she could not be pregnant. She just couldn't be._

_Not now. Not just two weeks after Joe moved out. Just five months ago, Joe promised her to love her 'until death do us part,' but after just a few short weeks, she had discovered that there was a lot more to a marriage than lust and sex. And their red hot affair had turned ice cold the second Emily turned up asking for help, until finally he shouted at her that he just couldn't take it anymore, that he couldn't be tied down._

_And he left._

_Sam collapsed against the bathroom wall, tears welling in her eyes. For the first time, she realized what her mother must have felt when she discovered she was pregnant with Emily: eighteen years old and completely alone._

_On a few occasions - and only when her mother was extremely drunk - she had ranted about how she should never have chased down their father again and forced him to marry her. How it had been the biggest mistake of her life._

_Sam sobbed harder, remembering how she always vowed never to be 'that girl' - alone and pregnant and with no options left in the world. She dreamt of one day traveling, of making it out of Kenosha and to New York City, and of making more of her life than her mother: working two dead end jobs to make just enough to pay for her spot in the trailer park._

_Wiping at her red, puffy eyes, she released pressure on her finger and saw that the bleeding had stopped. She rose from the cold tile bathroom floor with determination, resolved as to what she had to do. There was only one answer, and she would not turn out like her mother. It was better this way - for everyone._

_She strode out of the bathroom to look for the Yellow Pages, but she could not look in her reflection in the bathroom mirror as she passed._

xxx


	6. Chapter 6

xxx

_**chapter six**_

xxx

_i noticed tonight that the world has been turning  
while i've been stuck here withering away  
though i know i said i wouldn't leave you behind  
but i have to go, it breaks my heart to say_  
-Keane, "Can't Stop Now"

xxx

Martin leaned forward, setting his elbows on the edge of his desk and supporting his temples with both hands. He heaved a sigh from deep in his chest, his eyes crossed from staring at the computer screen for far too long.

At every corner, they ran up against dead ends and now as evening fell and the streets were getting dark, Martin pictured the tiny little girl trying to fend for herself in the city at night. Although Melanie was surely far more aware and savvy than other children her age, she was still just that: a child; and the thought of her out on the streets alone was not a pleasant one.

But every lead turned out to be false hope: her mother had not seen her, the bus driver could not catch up with her, and her sister's foster parents seemed to know nothing. Vivian and Elena had interviewed Katelyn's foster parents in great detail, and they knew nothing about what happened between the two girls during their brief meeting a week ago. Aside from regularly scheduled phone calls between the two sisters, Katelyn's foster parents had no contact with Melanie.

Furthermore, the girls' caseworker was out of town and would not be returning until the following morning. They were stuck and turning up empty, and he felt completely helpless as he watched it all unfold.

He heard a quiet shuffling behind him and turned around as Vivian leaned against the edge of his desk. "Not coming up with anything?" she asks softly.

He shook his head and pursed his lips together, sullen and restless in his professional concern. "I feel..." he begins, but trails off as words fail him.

"Helpless?" Vivian offered. "Useless? Futile? Like you're constantly going around in circles?"

Martin shrugged and offered her a half-smile as he replied, "Is 'all of the above' an option?"

"You and Sam both seem to be taking this case hard," she commented off-handedly and folded her arms across her chest. "Do you want to talk about it?"

He shrugged. "I feel responsible," he admitted. "I know there is probably nothing that either Sam or I could have done to prevent this, but that doesn't change that we created this whole situation." He paused to stare straight ahead, as though somehow focusing his gaze on his computer screen would will a lead to pop up. Turning back to Vivian, he continued softly, "If anything happens to her..."

"If anything happens to her," Vivian leaned in and finished for him, "You will have done everything in your power to help her." She patted his forearm as she shifted and turned to leave. "I need to go home and see my boys," she said, "but you know where to find me if something turns up. And Martin--" she paused, waiting until he nodded at her to signal he was listening. "It's 7:00. You might want to think about taking a break."

xxx

An hour later, Martin has not moved from his seat at his desk except to refill his coffee mug for the fifth time that day; even though there was nothing more he could do for Melanie that evening, he could not bring himself to call it a day and go home.

He thought he was alone, the last person left in the office after Vivian had gone, but he suddenly heard footsteps echoing down the hallway, the familiar click of a woman's heels inching closer and closer.

"Sam?" he asked, swiveling in his chair as she entered the bullpen.

"Hey, Martin," she exhaled softly and sat down at her respective desk, bending over to pick the contents out of the bag she was carrying. She set a series of DVD cases down on one corner of her desk and said, "I picked these up from security down at the subway stations along the G line. I might not find anything, but I have to try."

He nodded, understanding exactly where she was coming from. "You want some help?" he offered.

"That would be great," she smiled and replied. "I have all of the footage starting at noon today, so if she's on here somewhere, hopefully we'll be able to find her."

Martin stood and walked over to her desk, pulling up a chair to sit alongside her. Her entire body looked as tense and stressed as he felt, and as she began to boot up the laptop in front of them he asked, "Are you doing okay?"

She released a short, pulsed breath and chuckled self-deprecatingly. Her eyes sparkled with amusement as she retorted, "I hope that's a rhetorical question."

He smiled, grateful that they have reached the point where they can relax and tease each other once again. "It can be if you want," he paused for a beat, a satisfied grin on his face when she rolls her eyes at him. "But I won't object if you want to answer anyway." She remained silent as he finished but she kept eye contact, and he took it as an open invitation. "Emily?" he prompted, knowing how quiet and pensive she had been since they interviewed Theresa Watkins earlier this evening.

"Some people are just more responsible for their choices than others," she sighed, turning her eyes away from him. Offering him a self-deprecating smile, she inserted the first security disc into the laptop in front of them and began to run the footage, leaving him silently wondering about her seemingly layered response.

They settled in, watching tape after tape and coming up with nothing, but as they watched they made a game of commenting on the different people they saw passing by on the subway during the course of the day, from the well-dressed businessmen to the eccentric New York City street personalities. Even after all of these years after moving to New York, it still sometimes struck him how many different people passed through on the busy streets of the city. Sometimes it seemed a miracle that they could find any of their missing people in a city that bustled about so quickly, everyone wrapped up in their own business and not paying any attention to the hundreds of other people they might encounter over the course of a day.

"Frustrating, isn't it?" he proclaimed as Sam inserted yet another disc. "No one seems to think anything of a little girl walking the city streets alone at night?"

"It's a lot easier to find someone who wants to be found," Sam countered, "And from what I've seen, I'm not sure Melanie really wants to be found. Kidnapping isn't the issue here, and we can't establish a clear motive for her running away. There's a piece of this picture that we haven't found yet, and I'm beginning to think we're not going to find it on these security DVDs."

"It seems like everyone else in the city is on one of these," Martin commented, raising a hand up over his mouth to stifle a yawn. "Maybe we should take a break for a little bit. I haven't eaten since lunch today, and I'm starved."

Sam laughed. "True to form, Martin," she jabbed playfully, "if you hurry there might still be some Snyder's pretzels left in the vending machine."

"Gourmet dining, courtesy of your federal government," he quipped.

"Don't look at me," she retorted. "How about I run down the street to that Italian place and pick up a pizza?"

"Sure, sounds good," he replied. He loved that Italian restaurant and had always wanted to take Sam there when they had been dating, but he never suggested it. She never would have agreed; after all, it was only two blocks away and you never knew who could just pop in. Swallowing his regret like a lump in his throat, he smiled and said, "You can get whatever you want. Sausage and green pepper?"

She smiled and ran her hand along his shoulder. "We can get mushroom too if you want," she offered.

"Sure," he agreed, genuinely touched by her offer. He knew she didn't really like mushrooms, and while they were together he almost never asked for them when they were ordering out. He did not think she would even have remembered, but she had.

He decided that while Sam was gone getting the pizza, he would make use of the time and refill their coffee mugs. He placed her mug back down on her coaster, but took a long, deep sip from his as he returned to his seat. The hot, bitter liquid nearly burned his throat as he swallowed, but he barely felt it. He pressed 'play' on the laptop monitor and the security video marked "5:00-5:15 PM" began to play out before him, revealing six different angles as he watched people move in and out of the subway station.

He became so engrossed in watching the footage that he did not hear Sam return until she was almost right behind him at the conference table.

"Martin," she called out.

He frowned and looked at his watch; not even 10 minutes had passed since she left.

"You have a visitor," she said, and he glanced up, the look on her face even but unreadable. But standing on her right side, just a step behind her, stood Christine, smiling back at him as she held two pizzas up in front of her.

"Hey, Martin," she smiled, putting the pizzas down on the table in front of him. "When you didn't call back I figured you got caught up in the case, and since I've never seen where you work, I thought I would bring dinner to the rest of the team." She leaned over and kissed him gently on the cheek, and in spite of himself, he was grateful that he was with someone who could be openly affectionate, even with subtle gestures. "The problem is that I didn't actually know which floor you worked on, so I was just debating calling you when I ran into Samantha." She tucked a strand of her dark curly hair behind her ear and said, "I didn't know what the rest of the team liked, so I got one cheese and one pepperoni. I figured that way everyone would be happy."

He was so touched by her thoughtfulness that he did not have the heart to tell her that the entire rest of the team had gone home already, or that the pizza plans he and Samantha had did not include either cheese or pepperoni. Instead he smiled up at her and said, "Thanks, Chris. This is great."

"I, uh, I'm just going to go get some more coffee," Sam stuttered. "It was really nice to meet you, Christine," she said, quickly pulling away and shuffling into the break room although her mug remained at the table, full of the steaming hot liquid.

In Sam's wake, he motioned for Christine to sit and join him at the table. But as he ate a slice of pizza and gave Christine a cursory introduction to background of their current case, he could not force the blank, unreadable expression in Sam's eyes from his mind.

He felt his heart inexplicably torn in two different directions, and he had absolutely no idea what to do with these new conflicting emotions he was feeling.

xxx


	7. Chapter 7

xxx

_**chapter seven**_

xxx

_oh ball-breaking moon and ridiculing stars  
the older i get, the closer you are  
don't you have somewhere that you need to be  
instead of hanging here making a fool of me_  
-Sheryl Crow, "The Difficult Kind"

xxx

"Hey there, Hot Stuff," Danny jabbed playfully as he strode into the bullpen at sat down at the table alongside Sam. "Good morning!"

"Morning," she mumbled, not looking up from the security footage she was still viewing.

"Sam?" Danny poked her lightly on the shoulder and leaned in to see what she was watching on the laptop screen. "Jesus, Sam. Did you even go home last night?" He exclaimed, his tone half in annoyance and half in admiration. "You look like death warmed over," he commented finally.

Sam clicked out of the video and pressed the small button on the DVD drive to eject the disc. "Thanks, and you look like a million bucks." She removed the next disc and inserted into the drive. "I couldn't sleep, so I just got up early and came in to finish looking through these security DVDs."

It was at least partially the truth. Sometime after Martin left hand in hand with Christine, she lay down for a few hours in the break room but she had never actually gone home, instead opting for a change of clothes that she kept in her locker. Her mind was moving at warp speed, and there was no way she would have been able to sleep.

She knew instinctively that by this point Martin must have moved on and dated other women, but to actually know, to meet his girlfriend, was more than she had the strength to endure.

She had absolutely no reason to hate this woman; Christine had done nothing to her. But she felt an impulsive, irrational hatred towards the new woman who now held Martin's heart.

She managed to catch a glimpse of the sign in sheet at the security checkpoint downstairs the previous evening, and just an hour ago she impetuously decided to look up Christine di Mattia's records in the FBI's database. And the more she read about this woman, the more her illogical hatred grew. Christine grew up in Baltimore, Maryland; her father was a federal judge and her mother was a neurosurgeon at Johns Hopkins. She graduated Suma Cum Laude from Northwestern before deferring her acceptance to Harvard Law for two years to work with Teach For America back when the program was only a few years old. She now works for the DA's office, even though she was on the Harvard Law Review and probably could have been working for any firm she wanted.

_Intelligent, hardworking, from a good background, and a humanitarian to boot. Just perfect,_ Sam mused silently.

"Have you found anything?" Danny said finally, interrupting Sam's silent lamentations.

She shook her head and replied, "Hours of footage and not one damn thing."

Her cell phone began to buzz in her pocket, and she heaved a sigh as she flipped the phone open and answered, "Spade."

"Sam, it's me," Martin's voice echoed over the phone.

"Oh," she said, trying to keep her voice even. "What's up?"

"I just got a call from Valerie McMillan, Melanie and Katelyn's caseworker over at CPS," he replied. He took a meaningful pause, sighing heavily. "There was an incident at Katelyn's foster home early this morning. One of her foster siblings was taken to the emergency room at St. Vincent's. I'm uh, I'm on my way there now to find out more."

Sam felt her breath hitch in her throat, her mind racing as she wondered the implications of what could have been going on in Melanie's sister's foster home. She rose from her seat and began to gather up her things. "I'm on my way," she replied.

"Katelyn's foster father, Richard Dees, is in police custody right now, but I'm having him transported so that we can question him ourselves," he said, his tone business-like and very detached, however in her mind's eyes she imagined him closing his eyes as he usually did in frustration. "I should be there in about five minutes," he continued, "I'll let you know if anything changes."

"Sure," she answered, taking a deep breath to steady herself. "I'll see you when I get there."

She hit 'end' on her phone and flipped it shut.

She would file her regrets away for the time being; there were more important things to be done.

xxx

Sam flashed her badge to the security guard and was quickly ushered through the waiting room and back into the main ER. She scanned the busy treatment area until she saw Martin standing outside one of the rooms, talking on his cell phone.

"Okay, thanks... Yeah, I've got to go," Martin said, closing his phone as she approached. He slipped his phone back in his jacket pocket, "Hey."

"Hey," she exhaled, "What have we got?"

"Rachel Dees, Richard and Maryann's biological daughter..." Martin gestured about twenty feet ahead of them to the trauma rooms where one curtain was drawn closed, but commotion could be heard coming from within. "She's fifteen months old. Maryann couldn't wake her up this morning, she was barely breathing... It doesn't look good."

"And Valerie?"

"She's making calls for emergency placement for Katelyn, but she should be back shortly," Martin said, jamming his hands nervously in his pockets. "Sam," he started tentatively, "about last night..."

Sam felt her breath hitch in her throat, but she forced her facial expression to remain even. This wasn't about her anymore. "Christine seems great, Martin," she said, offering him a half smile.

"She, uh... she works for the DA's office. We met a couple of months ago," he replied quietly, his head still turned toward the trauma room where Rachel Dees was being treated. He finally turned back to look her in the eyes, and she wished he hadn't; it was much easier to pretend she didn't already know about Christine. "I hadn't planned on you meeting her like that," he admitted honestly.

"It's fine; I'm a big girl, Martin," she insisted, swallowing the lump in her throat. "I'm really glad that you're happy."

However, she was grateful when a tall dark-haired woman approached, interrupting them. "Agent Fitzgerald," the woman said offering her hand, "and you must be Agent Spade? I'm Valerie, Melanie and Katie's caseworker."

"How's Rachel?" Martin exhaled, his breath heavy and tension evident in his voice.

Valerie sighed and folded her arms protectively across her chest. "Not doing well. She's on a ventilator and they're taking her up to surgery right now."

"Surgery?" Sam asked as she wrung her hands together with nervous energy.

"I, uh... You'd have to get the doctor to explain it," Valerie replied and motioned towards the man in a white lab coat who was walking towards them.

"I'm Dr. Ferguson," he reached to the wall dispenser and cleaned his hands with antiseptic foam soap as he introduced himself. "I treated Rachel when she first hit the door."

"I'm Agent Fitzgerald, and this is Agent Spade," Martin replied, "The foster child who was living in the Dees' home, her sister is missing and we were hoping that what happened to Rachel might shed some light as to why our missing girl might have run away."

Dr. Ferguson was a tall man with graying hair, probably in his fifties, and he sighed heavily as he said, "I certainly hope that this has nothing to do with it."

"What do you mean?" she folded her arms across her chest, shifting her weight nervously from one leg to the other.

"Rachel suffered extensive injuries," Dr. Ferguson explained. "When she came in, she was barely breathing on her own; we had to intubate and put her on a ventilator to help her breathe. She had extensive bleeding in her brain, called a subarachnoid hemorrhage, as well as several broken bones - some of them old fractures."

"How did she get injured?" Martin inhaled sharply beside her.

"The mother said she found her blue in bed this morning, didn't know of any trauma. But based on the subarachnoid and the spiral fractures of both of her arms, I would say that Rachel was a victim of physical abuse," Dr. Ferguson said solemnly. "There's an old fracture of her right femur that makes me think this wasn't the first time, either."

Sam met Martin's eyes as the doctor finished speaking and realization set in.

"Listen," Dr. Ferguson said, "We're almost fifteen deep in the waiting room and they really need me to see some new patients, but let me know if I can do anything else to help."

"Thank you, doctor," Martin replied. When they were left alone, he turned to her and said, "This complicates things."

Sam bit her bottom lip pensively, the wheels in her head turning. "What if Melanie knew," she suggested. Martin furrowed his eyebrows inquisitively, and she continued, "What if she picked up on something when she spent time with Katelyn that afternoon last week, and she ran away to protect her sister."

Martin paused to consider her theory and finally said, "It makes sense, but then why hasn't she come by the Dees' yet?"

"I... I don't know," she exhaled, wiping her hands rhythmically against the leg of her pants. "It just... something doesn't seem right about all of this," she uttered uncertainly before turning to Valerie, who will still standing, pale and still beside them. "We're going to need to bring Katelyn in," she murmured. "I'd like to have her talk to one of the Bureau's psychiatrists."

"Of course, of course. Anything I can do to help," Valerie stammered and wiped ineffectively at her eyes, "I'm sorry, I just can't believe it... I put Katelyn in that house, I went by and visited. I can't believe I didn't see anything was wrong."

Sam grunted quietly, smoothing over a phantom crease on her suit jacket. The same thought had crossed her mind as well, but there was no point in dwelling on that right now.

"We need to head back to the Federal Building," Martin said finally. "But you will call us when you know more about how Rachel is doing?"

"As soon as I know anything," Valerie agreed.

Martin and Sam remained completely silent as they walked out through the registration area and into the parking garage.

Sam released a long, heavy sigh, feeling the weight of the world on her shoulders. "This just keeps getting more and more..."

"I know," Martin finished, touching her forearm reassuringly. "But everywhere we turn for answers we get more questions instead."

He looked at her with an indefinable sadness behind his eyes, and their gazes locked for a brief moment. But his cell phone ring began to echo in the dark, empty corners of the parking garage and she just knew from the look on his face exactly who was calling.

"I've got to take this," he said with a small smile. "I'll, uh... I'll see you back at the office?"

"Yeah," she breathed, her eyes following his form until it disappeared in the darkness. "I'll see you back at the office."

xxx


	8. Chapter 8

xxx

_**chapter eight**_

xxx

_this is not the first time_  
_i've watched the end of that thing that had no end_

_do you want me caring less_  
_sometimes we let go of what we need_  
_why can't you guess how i want to be loved_  
_you can't even tell me what of me you need_  
-Trespassers William, "What of Me"

xxx

Martin walked up to Vivian, who stood with her arms crossed in front of the two-way glass looking in on the interview room. As he approached, Viv tore her focus away from the interview in process and looked up at him.

"Hey Martin," she greeted him, before turning her focus back to the interview room before them.

"Hey," he exhaled in reply. Jack and Danny were sitting in front of Richard Dees, a balding man with a mustache and a beer belly. Jack and Danny were staring him down, and Dees wore a determined scowl on his face. "Are they getting anything out of him?"

Viv shook her head. "So far, he's refused a lawyer but he hasn't said much else. How were things at the hospital?"

Martin rubbed his face with his hand and released a heavy breath. "According to the ER doctor, it doesn't look good for Rachel. We'll get a call from someone at Child Protective Services when they know something either way. Do we have any other leads?"

"Elena is checking back in with all of the local hospitals and morgues to see if they have any Jane Does matching Melanie's description, and Sam is on the phone with Angela, the other caseworker who's worked with the Watkins girls. She's trying to get copies of Katelyn's medical records." Viv paused for a moment before giving him one of her patented knowing looks. "Weren't you and Sam both at the hospital?

Martin's eyes darted back to the interview room and he answered, "I got held up on my way out."

"Right," Viv replied. He could see her face reflected in the window, and she raised an eyebrow and smiled knowingly. She knew he was being purposely vague. She left it at that, however, and went back to watching Jack and Danny attempt to interrogate Richard Dees. Their suspect continued to be as uncooperative as ever, and Martin found his thoughts wandering back to the phone call that delayed him from leaving the hospital with Sam.

xxx

_He walked on ahead after telling Sam he needed to take this phone call. He flipped open his cell and answered, "Hey."_

"_Hey Martin," Christine's cheerful voice answered back. "How's your case coming?"_

_He sighed and ran his free hand over his forehead. "Not well," he admitted. He approached his parking space and took out his car keys, clicking the remote once. The remote beeped, and his car unlocked. Getting into the driver's seat, he leaned back against the cool leather seat and said, "The more we find out, the more I have a bad feeling about all of this."_

"_Oh," she answered._

_She went silent on the other end of the line, and he worried that he'd dampened her mood. "What's going on with you?" he asked._

"_Nothing right now. I'm pushing papers and waiting for Tony to bring me some files to look at."_

"_So you're looking to waste some time," he said, cracking a smile._

"_Always," she deadpanned back. "Actually, I just got off the phone with my parents. They're going to be in town at the end of the month for this big conference because my mom is getting some award from the AANS."_

_Martin frowned. "AANS?"_

"_American Association of Neurological Surgeons." She answered, her tone very matter of fact as though it was the most obvious thing in the world. He chuckled quietly in spite of himself, and she continued. "Anyway, they're going to be in town for the whole weekend and they wanted to take us out to dinner one night so that they can meet you. I told them I didn't know what your work schedule looked like, but I would give them a call back later."_

"_Okay," Martin answered, chewing thoughtfully on his lower lip. He gripped his phone a little bit tighter and reminded himself that this was what he wanted -- to move on. "What weekend will they be here?"_

"_Uh hold on," Chris stuttered, and in the background he could hear her shuffle papers on her desk. "They get in on the 18th and they fly back to Baltimore on the 22nd."_

_He ran through the call schedule in his head, but he couldn't remember that far in advance. "I don't have my schedule in front of me," he said finally. "But I'll take a look at it when I get back to the office and I'll let you know."_

"_Sure," she replied brightly. "Oh hey, there's Tony with the files I needed. I'll come by tonight?"_

_He leaned over the passenger seat and reached to open the glove compartment to retrieve his spare sunglasses, moving them to the cup holder to make them more accessible when he pulled out of the parking garage. "I'm not sure when I'll be done tonight," he said hesitantly._

"_That's okay," Chris answered, countering his hesitation with her own conviction. "I'll just use the keys that you gave me. I want to see you tonight."_

"_Okay great," he replied. "I'll see you then."_

_She said goodbye and hung up the phone, and he lingered for a few minutes with his car still in park._

_It was nice, he thought to himself, to be with someone who wanted the same things that he did. But that did not prevent the giant knot from settling in the pit of his stomach._

xxx

Martin's focus was dragged back to reality as he heard the sound of the chair legs scraping against the floor. Danny and Jack both stood up and left the room with a long, hard look back at Richard, who sat in his chair looking straight forward with an eerily emotionless stare.

"What do you think?" Viv asked as Danny and Jack approached where they stood.

"There's more to the story than we know right now, but we're not going to get anywhere until we wear him down a bit," Jack answered. "I think we sit on him for a few hours and see if some time under the bright lights leaves him feeling more agreeable."

Danny smirked and Viv nodded knowingly.

Jack looked over at Martin and asked, "How did it go at the hospital?"

Martin sighed and shook his head at the grim prognosis. "Not good. Rachel Dees was badly beaten and it looks like it's not the first time. She's in surgery now, but they said it doesn't look good."

Viv tilted her head and looked up at Jack. "We're running out of viable leads, and we're running out of time," she said. "This little girl is out there all alone, and she's looking for something or someone. We don't stand a chance unless we can figure out what that is."

Jack nodded and narrowed his eyes, deep in thought for nearly a minute. Finally he looked up and said, "You're right. I think it's time to go to the media." Jack let out a long breath and said, "Meet me back at the conference table in ten minutes. I'm going to go call our contact at Channel 12."

Back in the bullpen, Jack went immediately to his office to make a few phone calls, Danny and Viv both went straight over to the conference table to talk to Elena, but Martin made his way to the break room to grab a cup of coffee.

He pushed the door open and began to step inside when he heard Sam talking to someone. He hesitated for a split second but continued on inside. Her back was to him and she was running her hand through her blonde hair. She was on the phone, and from the sounds of it, she was talking to her older sister Emily.

"... I didn't know if you got the same message that I did. Andrew said that he saw that they called this morning, but they didn't leave a message and he couldn't get in touch with you."

She was quiet for a moment and shifted her weight from one leg to the other. She turned around and met his eyes, mouthing 'just a second' before speaking back into her phone. "No, she said that everything checked out and they're moving him out of the ICU and into his own room." She bit her lower lip as she listened to her sister, laughing softly. "No Em, I think that's just you. Listen, I have to get back to work but I'll give you a call later."

She flipped her cell phone shut and gave him a small half-smile. "Did you just get back?" she asked.

He shook his head. "I stopped by the interview room on my way up. Jack wants us all back out there in ten; he thinks it's time to go to the media."

Sam nodded silently, her hands gripping her coffee mug tightly. "Did Dees give them anything?"

He shook his head solemnly and walked over to the coffee maker. He grabbed his spare mug from the cabinet and closed the cabinet door with a soft thud, and he replied, "He barely said anything aside from refusing a lawyer. We're going to let him stew and see if that changes anything."

With a quick nod of her head, she crossed her arms and said, "I talked to CPS, and they're having all of Katelyn's medical records faxed over here. I also talked to Matthews upstairs and he's arranging for a warrant to get all of Rachel's records too. I'm not sure we'll find anything of use, but it's worth a shot."

She made a move towards the door, but before she took more than two steps he asked, "Was that your sister?"

She stopped and turned around to face him. "Yeah."

The expression on her face was soft and unreadable. He didn't want to push her too much, but he picked up his now-full mug and inquired, "Have you heard how Randy's doing?"

She tilted her head to the side and smiled. "That was actually what we were just talking about," she answered, confirming his suspicions. "He spent the last two weeks in the ICU with pneumonia, but the infection has cleared up and he's doing much better now. The doctors are moving him back to his own room, which his mom says is a good sign." She shrugged and bit her bottom lip thoughtfully. "She seemed hopeful."

He lifted his mug to his lips and inhaled the bitter hot liquid. He took a quick sip and looked up to meet her eyes. "What about you?" he asked softly.

She gave him a lopsided smile and answered, "I guess I am, too." She paused for a beat, her eyes sparkling mischievously, and she deadpanned, "But don't let that get out. I have a reputation to protect."

"Yes ma'am," he said, giving her a mock salute. "You're a regular old Pollyanna."

She turned her head and did something he hadn't heard her do in a very long time: she laughed.

xxx


	9. Chapter 9

xxx

_**chapter nine**_

xxx

_so give her information to help her fill the holes_  
_give an ounce of power so he does not feel controlled_  
_help her to acknowledge the pain that you are in_  
_give to him a glimpse of that beneath your skin_  
-Sia, "Sweet Potato"

xxx

Sam exited the elevator and strode purposefully down the hallway. As she approached the children's interview room, she slowed to a halt where Jack was conversing with two women.

"Hey Sam," he said, with a quick glance at the mirror in front of them. Focusing his attention back forward, he introduced her to Angela Miller, a pleasant-looking woman with dark skin, dark hair and a warm smile. Angela was one of the two caseworkers from Child Protective Services who handled the Watkins sisters' case. Sam shook hands with Angela and turned to acknowledge the other, whom she recognized as one of the child psychologists they worked with on occasion. Dawn Newell was a very tall, thin woman with auburn hair and green eyes. She always walked with a small limp leftover from a career-ending knee injury during her days as a college basketball star.

The four of them turned and peered in through the two-way mirror, watching Katelyn play quietly in the interview room. Their child interview room was set up much like you would expect any child therapist's office: the walls were painted a bright yellow and the entire floor was lined with toys, from dolls to blocks to a big easel that stood in the corner. Katelyn sat on the floor and rocked quietly back and forth as she meticulously began to build a tower out of the blocks.

Sam heard the soft click of the door as it opened and closed, and Dawn and Angela entered the room. Angela walked right up to Katelyn, touching her back gently just as Jack flipped the intercom on.

"Hey Katelyn, I want to introduce you to someone." Angela began brightly. Katelyn looked up, her eyes darting from Angela to Dawn and back again. The small girl pursed her lips, and Angela rubbed her back gently. "This is my friend Dawn, and these are all of her toys in here."

Dawn took a seat on the sofa so that the back of her head was to where Sam and Jack stood. "That's a nice tower you're building there," Dawn said in an encouraging tone. "Do you like to build with blocks?"

Katelyn nodded silently.

"Okay good," Dawn replied. "Angela and I are going to sit in here with you while we ask you some questions, but you can keep building if you like. Does that sound okay?"

"Mm-kay," Katelyn sighed quietly in agreement, her syllables slow and deliberate. She walked over to the bin and picked up a few more blocks.

They watched for a few moments as Katelyn placed the blocks down beside the base of her tower structure before Dawn began to ask her first question. "Who do you live with?" she started gently.

Katelyn did not even look up. "Richard and Maryann."

On the other side of the room, Angela fidgeted uncomfortable and sat down in a wooden chair that was clearly far too small for an adult. Dawn leaned forward and prompted, "That's right. And does anyone else live there with you?"

This time, Katelyn tilted her head to the side and looked up for a split second. "Rachel," she answered softly, turning her attention back to the colorful wooden blocks. There was a sadness in the little girl's voice and Sam could have sworn that she heard Katelyn hold back a sniffle over the intercom.

"What do you think, Jack?" she asked.

He turned the volume on the intercom down and said, "I don't know yet. She seems withdrawn, but how much of that is from her mother or from being separated from her sister? It's hard to tell."

Sam nodded and turned the volume back up, and they both stood deep in their own thoughts when a sudden loud crash came from inside the room. Sam snapped to attention just as the colored wooden blocks came tumbling down on top of the tiny child. Katelyn cried out and both Angela and Dawn immediately rushed to their feet.

Angela took Katelyn in her arms, but the little girl simply whimpered and pulled away. Angela would not be deterred, however, and walked over and sat down beside Katelyn in the corner of the room. "Show me where it hurts," she urged, her voice soft and soothing.

Katelyn shook her head but continued to whimper softly.

The door opened and closed with a click and Dawn walked out. She shook her head and crossed her arms and said, "I think we need to take a break. She's spooked, and I'm not going to get anything out of her until she calms down and feels a little more comfortable."

Jack turned his focus back to Dawn and nodded slowly. "Okay. We can leave them in here but I'll need you to call me as soon as you think you can start again. If she can tell us anything, I don't think it can wait much longer."

"I saw the press conference earlier. Has that helped you any?"

Sam tilted her head back towards Dawn and Jack for a moment, but her main focus was still in where Angela and Katelyn were sitting quietly together. Katelyn's back was to them, but she could see Angela talking to her and trying to calm her down.

"I've got most of my team answering the phones, but it's not helping as much as we'd hoped," Jack answered, his jaw tight and stress evident across his face.

"I'll let you know as soon as I think she's ready to start again," Dawn said with a long sigh. "But I can tell you one thing, by all the reports I was given to read she wasn't like this before she went to live with the Dees. Something happened there, I just need to find out what."

xxx

Sam shivered as she leaned against the balcony railing, suddenly wishing she remembered to grab her coat before she came outside. The sun shone brightly on the plaza below, and she blinked to shield her eyes. The breeze was blowing in, and she tried to collect her thoughts and composure. But even that was hard to do because every time she closed her eyes, Melanie's face would appear.

There was a rapping noise on the glass door, and she craned her neck just as the door opened and Vivian walked out. "You look cold," Viv said, holding her coat out to her.

"Thanks," Sam breathed, taking the coat and slipping it on.

Viv leaned with one side against the railing and said, "Someone from CPS called from the hospital. Rachel Dees is out of surgery and in the Pediatric ICU. It's pretty touch and go, but the warrant went through and we're getting all of her medical records faxed over here."

Sam nodded silently, running her hands against the cool iron bars of the railing. "Has Theresa Watkins come in yet?"

"Not yet," Viv answered, shaking her head and turning her body to face out against the plaza below.

It had been hours since they held their press conference and it had not been as successful as they hoped. However they did get one call from one of Theresa Watkins' neighbors that they saw her fighting with a girl who looked like Melanie the previous afternoon, so they were bringing Theresa in for formal questioning. Sam shifted her weight onto one leg and smoothed a crease in her pant leg. "If Melanie really was over there yesterday, Martin and I must have just missed her."

"Samantha." Viv tilted her head, giving Sam one of her patented motherly looks. "This case... it's really getting to you, isn't it?"

Sam closed her eyes and inhaled softly, nodding her head as the sunlight pummeled her through closed lids. She opened her eyes and looked down at the pavement below, watching the endless crowds as they moved about their everyday business. "It's more than that," she thought aloud.

She was spared from more of Viv's subtle probing questions when there was a knock from the window. Both women turned around to see Elena waving and motioning for them to come back inside. Sam fell in step behind coworker as they returned to the bullpen and knew she had dodged a bullet; there was no hiding the truth from Vivian Johnson.

Back inside, Elena explained that Theresa Watkins had been brought in and they were setting her up in one of the interview rooms. Five minutes later, Sam and Elena opened the door and saw Theresa sitting sullenly in one of the chairs. If Theresa Watkins had looked unkempt and disheveled the day before, now she looked ten times worse.

Elena sat down in a chair on the opposite side of the table, but Sam walked deliberately to the chair right next to Theresa, sat down and laid her hands down emphatically on the table. "We have a witness who tells us that they saw you outside your apartment building yesterday afternoon with a girl who looked remarkably like your daughter Melanie." Sam narrowed her eyes as she looked at Theresa, practically daring the woman to defy her.

"I... I don't know what you're talking about," Theresa stuttered in response.

Theresa was someone who made her entire life out of lying to other people but was never used to getting caught. There was a split second where she wore a deer-in-the-headlights look on her face, and that was all the tell that Sam needed to know to press this further. "You lied to me," Sam shot back, willing herself not to lose her temper.

"According to our witness," Elena stepped in, giving Sam a minute to recollect herself, "they saw you fighting with the little girl in the alley by your apartment building at about 2:00 yesterday afternoon. That's a good two hours before Agents Fitzgerald and Spade stopped by."

Sam shot Elena a grateful look and then glanced back to glare harshly at Theresa. She could sense that Theresa was close to breaking down and decided to push her just a little harder. "Look, you've already lied to two federal officers and if anything happens to Melanie, we'll go after you for obstructing a federal investigation, so I suggest you cut the act and tell us the truth." Sam paused for emphasis, making sure Theresa was listening closely. She raised an eyebrow, daring Theresa to challenge her, and said in her best no-nonsense tone, "If you lie to me again, I will personally make sure you never see either one of your daughters ever again."

There was an absolute silence, and Sam knew that she had won. "Okay..." Theresa said with a long heavy sigh, and she began to explain...

xxx

_Theresa squinted as she walked out of the building, the sunlight stinging her eyes and adding to the constant throbbing she felt in her head. She walked carefully along the back alleyway on her way to the liquor store on the next corner when she heard a soft voice calling out to her._

"_... Mom?"_

_I must be hearing things, she thought to herself, and she kept on walking. But she heard it again -- louder this time -- and she found herself turning around._

"_Who's there?"_

"_Mom, it's me." Melanie walked down the alleyway, holding her arms close to her chest._

_She was wearing a pink t shirt and khaki pants with flowers embroidered on the pockets, and her hair was cut shorter, shaped around her face. These clothes were new, not the thrift shop hand-me-downs she'd always worn in the past. Why on earth had she ever come back here?_

_When Theresa asked her daughter this much, Melanie scoffed in reply._

"_You're drunk, Mom," she scowled. "I thought you were getting better. I thought you __**wanted**__ Katie and I to come home again."_

"_Of course I do, Mel," Theresa pleaded. "I'm giving up the booze, I swear. I just need one more."_

_Melanie placed her arms emphatically on her hips, raising her voice. "It's always one more with you, Mom. I don't even know why I came back here."_

"_I always want you to come back here."_

"_No. No, you don't." Melanie rocked back and forth in place as she spoke. Looking at her daughter, Theresa was suddenly reminded that Mel would do the same thing when she was angry as a toddler. "Kate's new family... she's not safe there. I came back here because I thought you could help me. But you haven't missed us at all, you hardly even realized we were gone!"_

"_Melly!" Theresa protested._

"_Stop. Just... stop," Melanie dropped her hands down by her sides, her voice softened and cracked. She didn't look angry anymore; she just looked sad. "I hope you're happy..." Melanie paused, and there was a brief second when their eyes met before she looked away again. "I should have known better than to think you had changed."_

xxx

"... And then she just turned and walked away," Theresa explained, sniffling as she held back tears. "That's it, I swear."

Sam cast a sideways glance at Elena, a sinking feeling settling at the pit of her stomach. "You better hope that's all there was to it," her stern tone a sharp contrast to Theresa's emotional whimpering. "For Melanie's sake, and for yours."

"You'd better believe her," Elena warned, catching Sam's eye and winking. She rose from her seat and emphatically pushed her chair back underneath the table. "I've watched her take down men twice her size; you wouldn't stand a chance."

xxx


	10. Chapter 10

xxx

_**chapter ten**_

xxx

_there's an army in the east, there's a country in confusion_  
_and democracy is marching to the arms of evolution_  
_so gather up your fight, gather up your reason_  
_there is cause for every hope and a hope for every season_  
--Thea Gilmore, "Are You Ready?"

xxx

"_You're not the same guys from earlier." Richard Dees commented evenly, looking up as they entered the room. _

_Martin closed the door firmly behind him and followed Sam inside. Six hours after they went to the press, they still had no more viable leads to go on. As far as they could tell, Theresa Watkins' story about Melanie checked out, but a friend of Viv's over at the NYPD gave them a tip that Dees had been arrested for domestic violence thirteen years ago when he was engaged to another woman. The charges had been dropped, but Dees' brother-in-law, who also was a police officer, may or may not have had something to do with the charges "disappearing". So when Dees finally broke down and requested his lawyer, Jack decided that it would be a good idea to have new blood interview the suspect. Jack and Danny were waiting outside on the other side of the mirror._

_Through the course of their investigation, Viv's friend gave them several tips about Richard Dees: his then-fiancee left him but soon after he met Maryann. He never again had any domestic violence charges brought against him, but the police would be called in on occasion to investigate a noise complaint. The Dees moved frequently but had been relatively sedentary over the past three years, since about the time when Maryann would have been pregnant with Rachel._

_Martin had been shocked at how easily the Dees' foster parent application seemed to have gone through, but the social workers who had been involved all gave the couple rave reviews. Richard, it would seem, was quite a charmer when he wanted to be. Now though, it seemed he was starting to show signs of having been held in custody for a good ten hours and they might be able to get something out of him._

_Martin slid into the seat next to Sam and folded his hands on the table, saying, "No, we're not the same agents from before. I'm Agent Fitzgerald, and this is Agent Spade."_

"_So," Sam started, her eyes boring into the lawyer who now sat next to Dees. "Mr. Marbury, Is your client ready to cooperate now?"_

_Leo Marbury, a short man with dark hair and a receding hairline who made up for his stature by being exceedingly overbearing, eyed Sam and Martin with a cool smugness. "My client has been ready to cooperate from the beginning," he said. "I'm just here to make sure he is granted all of his rights."_

"_Of course you are," Martin replied coolly, not wanting to give away their hand. As far as Dees and his lawyer were aware, they were unaware of Richard's past escapes from justice. "We just have a few questions we need to ask your client."_

"_I told those other guys," Dees interrupted, snarling. "I didn't have anything to do with that other girl! I never even saw her!"_

_Beside him, he could feel Sam's breath hitch; she was already ticked off. "Oh really?" Sam challenged. "Because from where we sit, you look pretty suspicious. Your daughter is currently in intensive care, your foster child is in protective custody and is showing evidence of significant psychological trauma. Her sister ran away to protect her, and we've got proof that she was heading directly for you. No one has seen or heard from Melanie since yesterday afternoon, and in our eyes, that makes you a pretty good suspect."_

_Of course, they had no actual evidence that Melanie was heading for the Dees' residence but Richard did not need to know that. They assumed that was Melanie's new plan after she fled from her mother's, but their trail was going cold once again._

"_I didn't touch the bitch," Richard growled. His lawyer didn't say anything, but instead grabbed hold of Dees' forearm and gave him a menacing glare as if to say "shut up!"._

"_Okay, so you didn't touch Melanie," Martin hypothesized, his tone leading even though he didn't believe Dees in the slightest. "Then what about Rachel? Your daughter is fighting for her life; how did she end up in the hospital with bleeding in her brain and multiple broken bones?"_

"_I don't know," Richard shrugged, acting very casual about his daughter's critical condition. "Maybe she fell down last night, or tried to crawl out of her crib and fell back. Maryann just found her that way this morning."_

_He heard Sam start to breathe a little bit harder in ire. "I find that hard to believe, given that your wife is currently holding vigil at your daughter's bedside while you sit in here acting like it's no big deal." Sam's eyes bore down as she glared at Dees. "Let me tell you something, we have enough evidence against you that your brother in law isn't going to be able to save your ass this time." Sam raised her voice to challenge him while Dees narrowed his eyes, clearly irritated by a woman in a position of authority._

_Dees ignored his laywer's protests and glared at both Sam and Martin. "I don't think you have anything on me, bitch," he laughed it off._

"_Richard!" Marbury shouted at his client. "What my client means to say," Marbury turned to face the agents. "Is that this alleged evidence is likely circumstantial and will not prove anything, as my client is innocent."_

"_No," Richard interrupted, once again ignoring Marbury's objections. "What I meant to say was that this little blonde bitch can't boss me around."_

_Dees had kept it 'together' for most of the interview, but being challenged by Sam made something snap and he let loose. Dees stood from the table and Martin saw what was coming, but he saw it just a split second too late._

_Before he could do anything about it, Dees' fist made contact with Sam's face. She flung her fists back in retaliation and Martin sprung from the chair to help her restrain their suspect. Jack and Danny were through the doors at record speed, and they had Dees in handcuffs while Marbury shuffled off into the corner, still shouting at Dees to calm down._

_While Jack and Danny held Dees in restraints, Martin rushed out the door where Sam had retreated as soon as Dees was in cuffs. He couldn't find her anywhere in the hallway and knew she had escaped to the ladies' room. He knocked softly on the door and when he didn't hear anything, he swung the door open and cautiously entered._

"_Sam?" he called out. "Sam, are you okay?"_

_He heard a door creaking as she exited one of the stalls, holding a paper towel as pressure against her upper lip. He could see the early transition from angry red to blue of a bruise starting to form on her right temple, and the paper towel on her lip was soaked with blood._

"_I'm fine," she replied, her voice muffled by the paper towel as she held the pressure in place._

_He raised an eyebrow. "You're fine?" he asked gently. "You're always 'fine'."_

_She shrugged. "I'll be fine."_

"_Let me see," he urged quietly, taking the paper towel from her hands before she had a chance to protest. Her lip was angry and red and still bleeding profusely, so he got her a clean paper towel and held it tight against her face to apply pressure. "You, uh..." he said, finally realizing just how close they were standing to each other. He met her eyes and his breathing hitched, but he took a step back. "I think you're going to need stitches," he said finally._

_She looked back at him, her expression blank and unreadable. "Thanks, doc," she laughed in self-deprecation. "I guess I'll get it checked out, then."_

_He frowned. Sam never got evaluated medically without a fight, normally she never went until Jack forced her into it. "I can take you to the ER," he volunteered. "Someone should go with you."_

_Sam released a short, pulsed breath. "No, I'm fine," she insisted. "You should wrap this up and get home." She paused for a beat and added, so softly he wasn't even sure he heard her, "I'm just fine on my own."_

xxx

"Martin?"

The light from the bedroom switched on, and Christine ambled out into the living room.

"Martin? Are you awake?"

Martin frowned. He didn't think he was being loud, he just couldn't sleep and had come out to sit on the sofa and watch _SportsCenter_ on mute to try to distract himself. "I'm out here," he called out, his voice cracking from lack of sleep.

"What are you doing out here?" Christine said. Her hair was pulled up in a ponytail and she wore a long nightshirt as she rubbed her eyes sleepily and sat down next to him on the sofa. She ran one hand along his thigh and looked up at him, asking, "When did you get in last night? I didn't hear you come to bed."

Martin sighed guiltily, taking the remote control and turning the television off. "I didn't get back until late," he answered softly. He took her hands in his and tried to reassure her. "It was a rough night. One of our suspects beat up one of my coworkers and she had to go to the ER for stitches, and we are no closer to finding the missing girl than we were 36 hours ago. We're running on borrowed time now."

Christine lifted their entwined hands together and kissed them gently. "I'm sorry," she answered softly.

"No, I'm sorry," he said with a sigh. "I've been distracted by the case. I haven't been here for you like I should."

"No, no," Chris insisted. She brought her hand up and cupped it against the stubble on his unshaven face. "We're together, and it's your turn right now."

Martin met her eyes and kissed her hand, giving her a soft smile. "You're too good to me."

"I know I am." She grinned broadly, waggling her eyebrows, and laughed. "And don't you ever forget it."

He joined her laughter in spite of himself, but stood up from the sofa with a glance at his watch.

"Thank you, Chris," he said, bending over to kiss her again. "I think I'm going to shower and head in to work."

"Mar-tin," Christina sighed dramatically, still laughing. "It's 5:00 in the morning! It can't wait another three hours?"

He turned around and leaned against the doorjamb, shrugging his shoulders. "I just... I need to feel like I'm _doing_ something."

"Oh-kay," she smiled up at him from the sofa. She spun around and stood up, walking back toward the bedroom. She grabbed him by both hands and pulled him back inside, kissing him as she said, "Just remember that when all this is over... or whenever you want... I'm here."

"I know," he replied gratefully, walking into the bathroom and flipping on the shower.

About an hour later, he exited the elevator and walked out onto the mostly darkened hallways of the Federal Building. When he entered the bullpen however, he found that he was not alone.

"... No, no. Thanks for calling me. We'll be in touch."

He stood silently and watched as Sam hung up her cell phone and leaned back in her desk chair. Her long blonde hair fell back in cascades over the back of her chair as she rotated her neck, massaging it with one hand.

Deciding to announce his presence, he walked up behind her and said, "If I'd known you were already here, I would have stopped at Starbucks."

Sam's chair spun around and she looked up at him. Her face was now distinctly bruised, angry black and purple blotches across her temple and a soft suture line stemming from her lip. He hated seeing her bruised and beaten; it reminded him of how bad she looked after the Colleen McGrath case.

"Hey, Martin," she greeted. Her smile was tight and her whole body appeared tense. "You're here early."

"So are you," he countered, taking a seat at his desk and turning his computer on. It made a soft whirring noise as it came to life, the monitor light stinging his eyes in the mostly darkened bullpen. He flipped on the desk light and turned back around to find her watching him intently. "Couldn't sleep," he shrugged and motioned to her cell phone with his hands. "Do you have any new leads?"

"No. That was... that was the hospital." Her voice broke softly and her knee jerked restlessly in place as she sat. "Rachel Dees died at 3:13 this morning."

Martin closed his eyes and inhaled deeply, trying to steady himself; he had not been expecting this.

"The social worker I talked to said that she just slipped away. Her injuries were too severe and there was nothing they could do."

All Martin could do was nod slowly. "Was her mother with her?"

Sam ran a hand over her face and sighed. "Maryann stayed with her until the end, but they haven't seen her since. CPS and NYPD both need to talk to her about Richard, now that the charges have changed." Sam paused and furrowed her eyebrows, deep in thought. She spun around in her chair and pulled something up on her computer.

He walked up behind her and leaned with one hand on her desk, looking over her shoulder.

"Well we can assume that in all likelihood, Richard was abusing Maryann before he started on Rachel," her voice rose as her eyes focused on her computer screen. "Even though there aren't any charges brought against him, this probably wasn't the first time..."

Her voice trailed off and she looked up over her shoulder, meeting his eyes. Martin leaned back, shifting his weight so that he was sitting on the edge of her desk, and he watched her intently. She obviously was on to something, but he hadn't quite made the leap yet. "So what do you think?"

"Well, I bet..." she led, breathing deeply. She turned back to her computer screen and waited as the screen scanned for her search input.

Martin frowned, turning his attention back to the monitor. Before he could ask her what she was betting on, Sam held out her hand as if she were motioning for him to hold on for just a second.

"Here it is," she proclaimed when the search finished. "Paul Norman, Maryann's father. Arrested twice for public intoxication and once for domestic violence. That charge was dropped, but this was back in the 60's."

"So, then what?"

"You know that as well as I do that a lot of women who stay in abusive relationships do so because they had abusive fathers when they were children," Sam explained. She turned away from the computer and spun her chair, an expression of resigned acceptance on her face. "Maryann stayed with Richard for ten years, and she was the one who initiated their foster parenting application. There has to be more to it than that. Call it a crazy instinct, but something isn't sitting right about this."

She paused for effect and looked up to meet his gaze, and he felt an eerie chill run down his spine involuntarily. Her brown eyes shone with confidence as she declared, "She's the link that we've been missing; she's the key. Just... trust me."

xxx


	11. Chapter 11

xxx

_**chapter eleven**_

xxx

_building a map in order to find_  
_what's not lost but left behind_  
_my instinct got bruised_  
_but still i see_  
_i was a victim, i'll be no casualty_  
-Beth Orton, "Tangent"

xxx

"Can I get you something to drink? Coffee? Tea? Water?"

Sam took a few steps into the living room at the Dees' apartment, Martin's hand brushing against her back as he slid in behind her. Maryann Dees loomed before them, stoic and composed but dressed all in black. Her eyes were red and wet and her nose was runny, every evidence that she spent the better portion of that morning crying.

"We're both fine," Sam shook her head, offering Maryann a small sympathetic smile. "We're sorry we have to do this, but we need to ask you a few questions about your husband and your daughter."

"Of course, I understand." Maryann nodded gently, her voice soft and distant as though she were a thousand miles away.

Sam sat down on the sofa and felt cushions dip as Martin sat next to her. She leaned forward and heard Martin say, "Can you tell us what happened the night before last?"

Maryann seemed to compose herself as she sat on the chair opposite from them and said, "It was just any other night. Katelyn was eating a snack and I had just given Rachel a bath, but Rachel was holding her arm like it was hurting her and we were out of Children's Motrin. I left Richard at home with the two of them to run out to the store for some. I got caught up at the store, but I wasn't gone for more than an hour..." Maryann paused, sniffling and shaking her head. "When I got home, Richard was getting ready for bed. He said he'd put the girls down for me and that Rachel was feeling better. I wanted to go make sure she wasn't hurting, but I didn't want to wake her up. She's been such a restless sleeper."

_Of course she does,_ Sam thought, and she tilted her head to the side to meet Martin's eyes.

Martin shifted uneasily beside her. "Mrs. Dees, do you know why we're here?"

Maryann folded her hands across her lap, her thumb twitching slightly. Her face was hard and emotionless; she was clearly hardened and numb. "You said you wanted to ask me some questions about Richard and Rachel."

"We're so sorry about your loss," Sam said, trying to elicit an emotional response. When Maryann didn't bite, Sam continued. "Can you tell us what happened the morning that you found Rachel?"

"I woke up early. It must have been before 6:00 because Richard was still asleep..." Maryann's voice trailed off and she took a deep breath, showing emotion for the first time since she greeted them at the door. "I took a shower and started to get ready before I even thought to check on the girls. I checked on Katelyn, and she was fine... and then, then I went to check on Rachel. She was pale and blue, and she was barely breathing..." She looked down at her lap, staring intently at her hands. "I should have checked on her sooner. I... I should have known something was wrong when she slept through the night."

"It's not your fault," Martin spoke gently, shifting his weight where he sat. "What did the doctors tell you about Rachel's injuries?"

Sam knew what he was doing. By asking Maryann what the doctors told her, they would be able to gauge how much she herself was willing to accept and believe.

"They told me... they said that she was bleeding in her brain." Maryann looked off to one side, a clear sign that she was not being entirely forthright -- with them, and with herself.

While there was no autopsy report yet since Rachel had only died early that morning, Sam looked over the doctors' reports sent from the hospital that morning: the records were fairly gruesome. It seemed that Katelyn was immensely lucky she had not been the subject of Richard's physical rage.

"Mrs. Dees," Sam started. "Maryann--" she decided to use Maryann's first name to try to separate her from 'belonging to' her husband. "Can you tell us what happened the night before, when you got home from the store?"

Maryann glanced at the wall before looking up at her. "I don't understand the connection."

"Maryann," Martin leaned forward, folding his hands and squaring his shoulders. Sam was immensely grateful that Martin was there with her; he always had a knack for tact and diplomacy. She always suspected it was because his parents raised him for politics. "Did the hospital or the social workers talk to you about the possibility that Rachel's injuries were the result of physical abuse?"

"That's ridiculous!" Maryann snapped, visibly tensing. She recoiled and frowned. "How could you say that?"

"Your daughter's injuries were severe," Sam said, pulling out her notebook and glancing over a few notes she took down from the hospital records. "She was brought to the emergency room with a fractured skull and a subarachnoid hemorrhage, and her x-rays revealed several old spiral fractures." She paused and narrowed her eyes, ensuring that she had Maryann's full attention. Maryann was looking down at her hands, but Sam was satisfied that she was listening. "Before you protest and tell us that Rachel was unsteady and prone to falling, I talked to one of the doctors. Children have spiral fractures when their arms or legs are forcefully twisted."

Maryann flinched but remained silent, and Sam sensed that Martin still didn't get where she was going with this line of questioning. To be honest, she wasn't entirely sure herself; she just had a feeling that Melanie's trail vanishing led back to Katelyn, which could have put Melanie at the Dees' residence the evening before Rachel was rushed to the hospital. It was too much of a coincidence to dismiss.

"What I don't understand," Sam surmised aloud, "Is why you are so insistent on protecting your husband." She motioned to the angry bruises on her face and the suture line just above her upper lip. "Your husband did this to me while we were questioning him, and we've spoken with a woman who filed charges against your husband thirteen years ago for domestic abuse." Sam narrowed her eyes and raised her voice, "We have enough circumstantial evidence to get him convicted for your daughter's _murder_. Don't you get it?"

Maryann's eyes teared up and she cried softly. Sam took this as a sign that she was starting to get through and continued, "I understand how it happened. When you were little, your dad used to go out and get drunk. He'd come home and your parents would fight and the next morning, your mom would give you an excuse: she fell down the stairs or she tripped into her dresser, but you knew the truth. You swore your life was going to be different, so when Richard started hitting you, you never said anything."

Martin shifted forward and rose from the sofa, excusing himself to the bathroom. Sam silently caught his eye and thanked him as he left the room; this allowed her to talk to Maryann from a woman to woman perspective while simultaneously enabling him to sneak around and take a cursory look at the rest of the apartment unnoticed.

Sam stood from the sofa as well and squared her shoulders, walking to the love seat catty-corner from where Maryann sat. She could be more up close and personal this way, and she wanted to strike while she had the chance. Maryann _had_ to know something; otherwise, they were quickly going to be out of leads, out of time, and out of luck.

"I know that you're scared, and I know that you've been through a lot, but Katelyn's sister is missing and we have every reason to believe that she was headed here because she knew about your husband. Please, if you know anything, we need to find her."

Maryann's expression softened and her stiff posture relented. "I only met Melanie once, when we took Katelyn to meet her at the Central Park Zoo."

Sam clasped her hands together and willed her legs to remain still. "Did anything happen that day that you can remember?"

Maryann closed her eyes, thinking for a moment before shaking her head 'no'.

"Are you sure?" Sam asked again. "There's nothing you can think of, nothing out of the ordinary?"

"I can't think of anything," Maryann replied slowly. "When Valerie called me and said that she and Angela wanted to set up a meeting, they wanted it to be as low key as possible, so Richard walked around the Zoo with Rachel while I stayed with Melanie, Katelyn, Angela and Valerie."

Maryann fingered her small gold pendant absent-mindedly, drawing Sam's attention to it, and said, "I wish I could help you, but I don't think she's been anywhere near here."

"Maryann," Sam said firmly, her determination replacing disappointment, "you don't have to be the victim anymore. No man is worth sacrificing yourself, and that's before you take into account the fact that he was abusing you and your daughter and your foster daughter whom, I might add, you _willingly_ brought into this mess. No man is worth it."

Maryann did not respond, and Sam sighed and retreated with her into a pregnant silence that was only interrupted by the sound of running water from the bathroom. Martin re-emerged in the doorway and asked, "Is there any way I can take you up on a glass of water?"

"Of course," Maryann agreed, stepping to her feet and disappearing into the kitchen.

Sam moved back to the sofa and Martin sat down beside her. She leaned in to him and said in a hushed voice so that Maryann would not overhear, "Did you get anything?"

"Not much, just this..." he whispered back, pulling a small card out of his breast pocket and handing it to her.

It was a religious card, depicting a woman holding a rose. The woman had a small wound pictured on her forehead and there were a few bees present in the background. Sam flipped the card over and read the inscription: _St. Rita of Cascia, 1381-1457_, and on the next line read: _Avalon Center_.

"What is it?" She asked finally.

"I knew I recognized her medal when I first saw it but I couldn't place it, and then I found this hidden in her desk drawer upstairs," he explained, wringing his hands together. "St. Rita of Cascia is the patron saint of lost causes... and battered women, and Avalon is a battered women's shelter in Hamilton Heights."

"Okay, so what does that mean?"

Martin leaned back against the sofa cushions, but before he got a chance to answer, the soft buzz of his cell phone broke his train of thought. "Fitzgerald," he replied, sliding his phone open and speaking into the receiver. "I was just going to call to see if you could check on something..." He paused briefly, listening to the person on the other end of the line, whom Sam could only assume was another member of the team. "Yeah, a safe shelter for battered women in Washington Heights, and no, Sam and I are with Maryann Dees right now." Martin stopped to listen again, and his expression fell. "No, no. That's fine," he replied, his tone somber and pensive. "Okay, I'll check in again after we ask a few more questions here."

Saying goodbye and closing his phone, Martin turned back to her and said, "That was Elena. They found Melanie early this morning behind a dumpster three blocks from here. She's still alive, but just barely. The garbage collectors found her a few hours ago, but she was registered as Jane Doe when they brought her to the hospital and it took them a little while to make the connection. She's hypothermic, but they expect her to recover."

Sam closed her eyes and inhaled deeply in relief, but after allowing herself those few seconds of respite, the wheels in her head begin to turn once again. Opening her eyes, she asked, "They found her just a few blocks from here?"

Martin opened his mouth to answer, but instead he looked up and said, "Thank you so much," to Maryann, who had returned with two glasses of water in hand.

Her behavior still puzzled Sam, but if she had seen anything in her years of working Missing Persons, it was that everyone dealt with grief in his or her own way -- especially people who had been through as much as Maryann had.

"It's not a problem," Maryann said, handing one to him before turning and offering the other to Sam. "I know you didn't ask for anything to drink, but I thought you might like something."

Sam took the glass and nodded, "Thank you."

Maryann sat back down and made direct eye contact with Sam for the first time since they had arrived at the door, saying, "I know you must think I'm weak, but it's not easy to let someone go when you love them, no matter how bad they are for you." She blinked as she fingered her necklace once again. "So in the end, I guess, I'm no more guilty of anything but repeating the sins of my mother."

Sam laughed softly in her own self-deprecation, raising an eyebrow and arguing, "The problem with that is when you continue to love the wrong person, you're not the only one who ends up getting hurt."

xxx


	12. Chapter 12

xxx

_**chapter twelve**_

xxx

_and the battle's just begun_  
_there's many lost, but tell me who has won?_  
_the trenches dug within our hearts_  
_and mothers, children, brothers, sisters_  
_torn apart_  
-U2, "Sunday Bloody Sunday"

xxx

Martin grabbed hold of the side handle as Sam parallel parked, the car jerking suddenly as she pulled to a stop. Putting the car in park, Sam tilted her head to the side and lifted her sunglasses up so that he could see her glare at him. "Don't say it," she warned, a small hint of a smile tugging at the corner of her lips.

Martin unbuckled his seatbelt and clutched his hand to his stomach as he joked, "You should keep Dramamine on hand for anyone gullible enough to get in the car with you, you know."

Sam said nothing, instead shoving him playfully in the shoulder before opening the car door and stepping onto the sidewalk. Martin looked over his shoulder, quickly glancing at the oncoming traffic before following suit.

He followed Sam into the alleyway, passing the yellow 'Crime Scene: Do Not Enter' tape and the white government-issue RV that signaled the Crime Scene Unit team had arrived before them. Sam hung back, but he walked up to the CSU team leader and asked, "What have we got here?"

"No much yet," he replied, turning to motion towards the dumpster where several of his investigators were bent over with evidence bags or cameras. "We've only been here long enough to set up. Are you two the agents from the FBI?"

"Oh, yes. I'm sorry. I'm Agent Fitzgerald," Martin held out his hand to shake and then motioned back to where Sam was talking on her cell phone, "and that is Agent Spade. We've been investigating the disappearance of Melanie Watkins', the girl who was found here a few hours ago."

"Mark Daniels," the man introduced himself. "I'm the shift supervisor. NYPD called us down here before we got wind that this was under your jurisdiction."

"Don't worry about it, we'll take anything you can give us," Martin replied, glancing around the alleyway and taking stock of the area.

Sam walked up behind him and said, "I just got off the phone with Danny. He's bringing Cecilia to the hospital to stay with Melanie, Jack is meeting with the garbage men who found her here, and Viv and Elena are on their way to the Avalon Center to see what the connection is to Maryann Dees."

"And Melanie?"

Sam blinked and glanced down before answering, "She's still in critical condition. It would be great to find something here that would actually link this to Dees."

"Isn't that the truth," he said, letting out a long sigh and looking around again.

"Yeah," she agreed, crossing her arms protectively on her chest. "Jack is letting NYPD talk to Dees right now about Rachel, but still back at the office so we should have another crack at him later."

Martin took one look at the bruising on her face, hidden by make up to the best of her ability, and raised in eyebrow, saying, "As much as I know you want to be the one to get him, I'm not sure it's wise for you to be in the same room with Dees anymore."

She shrugged. "At least not until the trial."

He nodded in agreement when he saw one of the CSU investigators by the dumpster stand up and call out, "I've got blood over here."

The voice belonged to a female who stood up and held several samples up to Daniels. She was tall and thin with wavy auburn hair, and as he and Sam approached, the woman eyed them skeptically. "Who are they?" she asked Daniels.

"We're Agents Spade and Fitzgerald," Sam said, throwing her shoulders back as they approached.

Daniels shot the woman a warning look. "They're the FBI Agents who were investigating the vic's disappearance. Agents," Daniels turned his head to face them directly, "This is Jen Marro."

Marro eyed them suspiciously at first, but her eyes lingered as she looked at Martin. He cast his eyes away, uneasy under her scrutiny.

Sam cleared her throat and said, "Okay, so what do you have?"

"Right," Marro said, snapping back to attention with one last quick smile in Martin's direction. "I found a few spots of what looks like blood over there behind the dumpster, where they found the vic. I'm going to have the samples sent to our labs to be analyzed."

Sam pulled on a pair of gloves and said with a frown, "Okay, well we're going to go have a look for ourselves."

Martin followed suit, perplexed by Sam's recent behavior. His head was still spinning from her earlier comments about loving the wrong man. What did she mean, and more importantly, to whom was she referring?

"Have we contacted Waste Management yet?" Sam asked, bending over to study the blood stains on the ground. "We don't want them to destroy any evidence that might have been tossed in the dumpster."

"Elena said they found Melanie before they emptied the dumpster, and the first NYPD unit to arrive secured the scene. Everything should be as it was when they found her."

Sam looked up and grimaced. "I knew I shouldn't have worn my new shoes today," she laughed softly. "I always wear new clothes on the days we go dumpster diving."

He grinned. "You know what they say: Always be prepared."

"Whatever you say, Boy Scout," she teased.

Martin laughed, shaking off his doubts for a few moments to enjoy being casual and friendly with Sam like they used to be. The sun peeked out from behind a cloud and reached them down in the alley, and Martin saw something sparkle on the ground, catching his eye.

He bent over, hissing softly as he felt a twinge in his hip. It still gave him trouble from time to time, and he was told to expect occasional problems with it for the rest of his life.

"What do you see?" Sam tilted her head to one side, watching him intently to see what he was looking at.

Martin held up a small diamond stud earring for her to see before dropping it in an evidence bag. "Funny place to lose an earring, isn't it?" he said, thinking out loud. He wasn't sure it was even evidence, since Melanie didn't have pierced ears and, even if she did, would almost certainly not have been in possession of a diamond earring. But nevertheless, he carefully closed the evidence bag and pocketed it just in case.

"Mmm," she agreed with him, standing up as a noise started to come from the other side of the dumpster.

"What are we looking for?" Jen Marro's voice carried over to them.

"Nothing in particular," came another voice, one that did not belong to Daniels. This voice spoke with a thick Puerto Rican accent. "Anything that might be evidence."

Walking around to the opposite side of the dumpster, Jen stood next to a portly Latino man who introduced himself as Carlos Diaz.

"I would be looking for something that was thrown in here hastily," Sam commented. "This was a sloppy job, my guess is the doer got pulled away and didn't get to clean up after himself. Maybe he threw something in here without concealing it in his rush to get away."

"What you're really saying is that you don't want to open the trash bags up unless we have to," Martin teased.

Sam put her hands up and laughed, protesting, "Your words, not mine."

The four of them worked out an assembly line as they slowly pulled the trash bags out one by one. Martin silently found himself wishing he had a cold so that he wouldn't be able to smell the foul odor emanating from the dumpster.

"Wait a minute, I think I see something," Sam said, leaning over and pulling something out. Sam held out a brown suede jacket, studying it intently. "Think this could be blood?" she wondered, holding the jacket out so that he could see it as well and motioning to a stain on the sleeve.

"It's definitely possible," he replied. "But this is a woman's jacket."

"Well," Sam replied, narrowing her eyes as she thought aloud. "We know Melanie left her own jacket behind on the bus, maybe she found this one and was using it... It's been cold at night."

Martin took the jacket and started to search it, looking through the pockets to see if there was any information that might identify the jacket's owner. He pulled several cards out of one pocket and immediately he heard Sam gasp. Glancing down at the cards, he saw why: each one was the exact same image of St. Rita of Cascia. These were the same cards as the one he found in the Dees' apartment.

"It couldn't be. Could it?" Sam said quietly, not expecting an answer to her rhetorical question. "But it has to be."

"I'm not one to believe in these kinds of coincidences," he replied. "It looks like we're going to need to ask her a few more questions."

After spending a few minutes wrapping up with the CSU team and giving them instructions to call them with anything else they found, Martin and Sam were in the car and heading back towards the Dees' apartment building. They did not have to go back up to the apartment when they arrived however; instead, they ran into Maryann in the lobby.

"Mrs. Dees," Martin called out. "Maryann, we need to talk to you."

Maryann stopped and turned around, eyes darting from Martin to Sam and back again. She was nervous.

"I, uh, I have an appointment with the funeral home," she said.

"It's going to be a few weeks before the coroner is ready to release the body," Sam replied, her voice firm and brisk. "Are you planning on going somewhere else?" She challenged, motioning to the duffel bag slung across Maryann's shoulder. "I don't know many people who bring their overnight bag with them to the funeral home."

"Agents! Can't we talk about whatever it is later?" Maryann insisted. There was now a hint of desperation apparent in her voice. "I have an appointment, and I need to go now."

"Look, Mrs. Dees," Martin closed the gap between them until he was just a foot away from her. Once he had her full attention he squared his shoulders defiantly and lowered his voice. "We can do this the easy way, where you come with us without a fight," he explained abruptly, becoming more suspicious now that he saw Maryann's obvious jitters; a sure sign that she was hiding something. "Or we can do this the hard way, where you come with us in handcuffs. We both know that you don't want that, so why don't you just come with us the easy way."

It was not a question so much as a command, and Maryann looked from him to Sam and back again before relenting.

When they arrived back at the FBI building, they immediately brought Maryann up to one of the interrogation rooms, careful to ensure that she did not pass the room where her husband was currently being held.

"Sit down," Sam ordered, raising her voice. When Maryann complied, Sam pulled a polaroid photograph of the jacket out of her notebook and placed it forcefully on the table. "Do you recognize this jacket?"

Maryann flinched just slightly at the sight of the photograph before regaining some composure and replying, "No, I've never seen it before."

"Oh really," Martin said, eyeing her skeptically. Changing his tone of voice, he smiled and commented, "That's a nice necklace that you're wearing." Because he didn't want to give away the fact that he had been snooping around her apartment, he tried instead to get her talking about the necklace itself. Hopefully she was jittery enough that she would take the bait.

"Thank you."

"You know, I went to Catholic school for thirteen years," he continued, trying to lead her on. "But I don't recognize that medal. Who is she?"

"St. Rita," she replied, clasping the medal in her hands as she spoke. "She, uh... Rita is my Confirmation name."

"Really?" Martin commented, trying to sound as off-handed as possible. "Because I find it a coincidence that there were several religious cards in one of the jacket pockets that depicted that very saint. St. Rita isn't a very common patron saint, Maryann. But then, I'm sure you know that."

"I don't know what you're talking about..."

"You can stop lying to us now," Sam interrupted. "We've sent a hair we found on the jacket to our forensic lab, I'm willing to bet that it's _your_ hair."

"Those are nice earrings you're wearing," Martin added, the small silver hoops she wore catching his eye as he suddenly remember the diamond stud he found earlier. He took the evidence bag out of his pocket and placed it out in front of him on the table, still firmly gripping the bag with both hands. "If I were to go through your jewelry box, would I find anything missing?"

"Give it up, Maryann," Sam warned, raising her voice. "Just tell us the truth, and we can make this all go away. I'm only going to ask this one more time. Tell us the truth now, or you'll miss your chance." Sam paused for effect, squaring her shoulders as she spoke slowly and deliberately. "Did you hurt Melanie?"

Maryann's entire demeanor changed when she heard Sam say Melanie's name. She released a quick, pulsed breath and narrowed her eyes, looking across the table to where Sam and Martin sat as she replied in a soft, even, eerily composed voice. "Did I hurt _Melanie_?" she repeated slowly. She appeared calm and stoic as she looked Sam directly in the eyes and said, "That bitch was going to ruin everything."

xxx


	13. Chapter 13

xxx

_**chapter thirteen**_

xxx

_all these wasted dreams_  
_waiting for the sun to open up my heart to anyone_  
_bring me some rain_  
_because i'm dying and i can't get this damn thing closed again_  
-Counting Crows, "Children in Bloom"

xxx

"_Can you get that, already?"_

_Richard's gruff voice carried in from the living room, and Maryann leaned forward and turned the faucet off, wiping her hands on the dishtowel as she craned her neck around and stepped away from the sink full of dirty dishes. Her fingers were just starting to get soft and wrinkled, and she rubbed her hands together to warm them up._

_She walked through the kitchen and out to the entrance hallway, groaning once again in frustration at the impossibly high peephole that served no purpose. Wiping her hands off once more, she unlatched the chain and turned the bolt, opening the door._

"_Mrs. Dees?"_

_The visitor was a young girl, just shy of being a teenager, with wide green eyes and thin, fine blonde hair. The girl smiled sadly, and Maryann felt like she recognized the child, even though she couldn't put a finger on why._

"_I'm sorry?" She asked, raising her voice just slightly and hoping her husband would not hear. "Who are you?"_

"_You've met me before," the girl countered, placing her hands on her hips. "I'm Katie's sister. Well, her real sister."_

_Maryann narrowed her eyes, realization dawning on her. "Oh, right. Do you need something Melissa?"_

"_Melanie," the girl corrected crossly. "Is your husband home?"_

_Maryann sighed. This girl was quickly becoming irritating. "He's inside watching TV with the girls, not that it's any of your business."_

"_My sister __**is**__ my business," she replied. Her hands moved from her hips as she folded her arms across her chest. "And I know about your husband. All I want is to keep Katelyn safe."_

"_She is safe here."_

"_Oh, come on," Melanie cried out. Maryann glared at the girl to keep quiet, but Melanie ignored her silent plea. "I saw him with her at the zoo last week. He had her behind a few trees, and he was pulling her arm and he hit her and threw her on the ground."_

"_I don't know what you think you saw," Maryann warned. "But that's my husband you're insulting with your lies. I need you to go now."_

"_Do you think I'm just going to go quietly?" Melanie asked. The determined expression she wore on her face made Maryann feel incredibly nervous._

"_Look, just... hold on," she said. Walking back into the living room, she took one look at Richard watching ESPN with a beer in one hand and remote control in the other and knew she had time to take a walk and deal with this problem. She told Richard she was running downstairs to look at something with the landlord, and he grunted his acknowledgement._

_With that, Maryann grabbed her jacket off of the coat rack and headed out the door, locking it quietly behind her._

"_Okay, Melanie," she said, emphasizing the girl's name. She put one arm and then the other through the sleeves of her coat and turned around. "You want to talk about this? Let's take a walk."_

_Opting not to take the elevator, she took off down the stairwell, gaining momentum as she made her way down to the lobby of the apartment building. She threw the front door open, glad to see that the security guard seemed to have abandoned his post, and by the time the cool night air hit her full force, she was walking so briskly that Melanie had to run to keep up._

_After a few blocks, she heard Melanie call out, "Okay, where are we going?"_

_Coming to a stop, Maryann quickly pivoted so that she was facing the young girl. "What do you think you're doing?" she hissed, her frustration finally breaking through the surface. "Coming to my home and insinuating horrible things about my husband!"_

"_They're true, aren't they?" Melanie squared her shoulders; she had more spunk than Maryann had given her credit for. "I mean, it's not just Rachel he hits? It's you too, isn't it?"_

"_He doesn't mean it."_

"_It's an accident, right?" Melanie rolled her eyes as she spoke, and Maryann glared back. "He always says he's sorry and it'll never happen again, but it does. And you brought my sister home to that when I know deep down you know the truth!"_

_Melanie was yelling now, to the point that she was scaring Maryann. They were alone on the street, but what if someone else came passing by?_

"_It's none of your business," she scolded._

"_That's not what the police are going to say!" Melanie shouted back, waving her hand in the air for emphasis._

_Before she knew what was happening, Maryann flung her fist forward and punched Melanie in the face with such force that she fell backwards, hitting her head on the metal railing that held up a street sign. Still in a daze, Maryann stared blankly at Melanie who lay on the ground unconscious, her nose bleeding and face bruised._

_Still stunned by her own actions, Maryann acted on autopilot: carrying Melanie into the dimly lit alley just a few feet away, hiding the body behind the dumpster, and discarding her now-stained jacket._

_She wandered the streets alone for over an hour before she finally returned home to find the girls already in bed and Richard in the bedroom._

"_Rachel spilled grape juice on the living room carpet," he grunted in acknowledgement when she entered the bedroom. "So I put the girls down early. You should clean it up before you come to bed."_

xxx

"Sam?" Danny called her name, breaking her train of thought. "You okay there?"

They were sitting in the waiting room of the Pediatric ICU, waiting for Katelyn to arrive with her caseworker Angela. Katelyn's status had changed following Maryann's arrest and she had been temporarily placed in a group home, but at Danny's suggestion, Sam had arranged for Angela to bring Katelyn down to the hospital to visit her older sister.

After arresting Maryann three days prior, they were able to get a full confession. Her lawyer said she was willing to plead guilty in return for a lesser sentence, and they took the plea.

They were also able to piece together what must have happened to lead up to Richard's assault and murder of his own daughter. According to Katelyn's third session with the child psychologist, Rachel was irritable when her mother wasn't home to put her to bed and Richard, frustrated with the toddler's tears, picked her up and threw her down on the floor. The subsequent forensic investigation and ME report agreed that the impact of her head hitting against the hardwood floor would have caused the skull fracture and subsequent hemorrhage in her brain.

Melanie, meanwhile, had woken up and corroborated Maryann's story. She was feeling much better all things considered, and was being kept one more night for observation before she could go home with Cecilia again.

Sam looked up at Danny and said, "I just can't get it out of my head."

"What do you mean?"

"Maryann Dees," she answered, wringing her hands together anxiously. "I think I want to feel sorry for her, but I can't."

Danny nodded slowly and replied, "She's a victim too, but I know what you mean. It's hard not to blame her when she willingly brought Katelyn into their home when deep down she knew it was only going to make things worse."

Sam nodded in agreement. "It was all about appearances, I think. From what Viv and Elena said, Maryann _volunteered_ at the Avalon Center. There's no way she ever would admit that she was being abused herself; fostering Katelyn was part of her subconscious decoy." Sam glanced away, scanning the waiting room, and said, "That doesn't make it any more forgivable... But what really gets me is that Richard and Maryann were approved as foster parents in the first place."

Danny shrugged, meeting her eyes as he said, "The system is broken. There are never enough foster families to go around, let alone good ones." He paused for a beat, working his jaw, and asked, "What about the mom? Has anyone been able to get in touch with her?"

Shaking her head, she replied, "The phone line was disconnected a month ago and we've sent an agent by a couple of times, but no one has seen her since she left the Federal Building after we interviewed her. We have no way to get in touch with her, and Jack wants to let CPS take that angle over."

"That's the problem with this job sometimes," Danny reflected aloud, "Once we find them, our job is over even if there's a lot more left to be done."

"Yeah," Sam breathed in agreement. She looked up as she saw Angela enter the waiting room with Katelyn, and added, "But sometimes, we get to do something like this."

Danny nodded and squeezed her hand affectionately before they both rose to meet Angela and Katelyn, leading them to Melanie's room. Cecilia was sitting at Melanie's bedside and the two of them were playing cards, but the second that Katelyn entered the room, Sam could see Melanie's face light up.

Collecting up the cards, Cecilia stepped away to make room for Katelyn and Angela before walking over to the corner of the room where Danny and Sam stood. "I've been meaning to say thank you," she said softly.

"You're welcome," Sam replied. It always made her feel a little bit self-conscious when people thanked them for doing their job, no matter the outcome of the case.

"Really," Cecilia went on. "You found her and brought her back to me, and then you went out of your way to arrange this visit for her when no one else would have thought of it. Look at how much she's perked up in the last five minutes."

Glancing up at the two girls, Sam saw that Melanie was not the only one who was benefiting from their visit. Katelyn now sat beside Melanie on the bed, looking far more animated than the terrified, withdrawn child she had been just a few days before. She was chatting quietly with her sister and inspecting a stuffed bear that had been given as a get well soon gift.

"It's hard to be separated from your sister," Sam commented, trying to sound as nonchalant as possible.

Cecilia smiled softly. "You sound like you're speaking from experience."

Sam smiled back, avoiding Danny's pointed look. "I guess I am," she admitted.

Cecilia sighed heavily, her gaze fixed on the two sisters sitting together on the hospital bed. "I would take both of them home with me in a heartbeat," she said ruefully, pursing her lips together. "But CPS would never let me. It was enough of a fight when I decided I wanted to do this in the first place. I'm mean, I'm 53 years old, my husband is dead, and I've never had children before. I was surprised when they finally let me take Melanie."

Sam looked up, meeting Danny's gaze, and she knew that he was sharing the same regrets she currently harbored. She waited until they said their goodbyes and were alone walking back down the hospital corridor before she lamented, "It doesn't seem fair that CPS won't let Cecilia keep those girls together, when no one noticed anything wrong with the Dees on multiple evaluations."

"None of it is fair," Danny agreed. He slowed his pace and when Sam glanced up at him, she could see him working his jaw. "But maybe it's not as hopeless as you think."

Sam slowed down as well, finally stopping as they reached the elevator. She leaned forward and pressed the small silver button, looking back at Danny as she asked, "What do you mean?"

Danny shrugged as the elevator bell clanged and the doors slid open. Stepping into the elevator car just in front of Sam, he spun around and said, "Maybe I was wrong before. Maybe our job doesn't have to be over just yet."

xxx


End file.
